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THE DAUPHIN (Louis XVH) 
THE RIDDLE OF THE TEMPLE 



Boohs by G. LENOTRE 



A Gascon Royalist 

Romances of the French Revolution 

The Flight of Marie Antoinette 

The Last Days of Marie Antoinette 

The Revolutionary Paris 

The Dauphin: Louis XVII (Translation) 

The Tribunal of the Terror 




THE PRISONER OF THE TEMPLE 
From a picture belonging to M. H. Foulon of Vaulx 



THE DAUPHIN (LOUIS XVII) 



THE RIDDLE OF THE TEMPLE 



'fV'sS.''^ 



FROM THE FRENCH OF 

G. LENOTRE ^ \-.^^-^ -\ 

BY 

FREDERIC LEES 




ILLUSTRATED 



GARDEN CITY, N. Y. , AND TORONTO 

DOUBLEDAY, PAGE & COMPANY 
1921 



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COPTHIGHT, 1921, BY 

DOUBLEDAT, PAGE & COMPANY 

ALL EIGHTS RESERVED, INCLUDING THAT OF TRANSLATION 

INTO FOREIGN LANGUAGES, INCLUDING THE SCANDINAVIAN 

PRINTED AT THE CODNTHY LIFK PRESS, GARDEN CITY, N. T., U. S. A. 

First Edition 



^0 I 



PREFACE 

The following narrative of the captivity of the little 
King of the Temple is to be distinguished from the 
numerous works treating the same subject, inasmuch as 
it is based entirely on official documents and authorised 
testimony, intentionally omitting the touching and doubt- 
ful legends under which the thread of this sorrowful story 
has too often disappeared. It does not follow that no 
deduction is allowable. The gaps in this confused 
chronicle are numerous and, in order to set forth the 
peripetia without too many interruptions, one must indeed 
sometimes have recourse to the subterfuge of argument; 
yet it has been made use of with reserve and through neces- 
sity, preferring, in the absence of certainty, an avowal of 
doubt to a rash affirmation. From the comparison of these 
presumptions and these indisputably authentic facts re- 
sults a fresh solution of what Louis Blanc calls the 
Mystery of the Temple, — a partial but unexpected solution 
which will perhaps astonish my readers, which will shock 
some of them, and which, it is to be feared, will satisfy 
nobody completely, since it does not lead to the desired 
end. It presents, however, the advantage of a rigorous 
connection with what we know of the history of the 
Temple and it restores to the boyish figure of King 
Louis XVII the too unrecognised place which it uncon- 
sciously held in the politics of the Revolution, 



CONTENTS 

CHAPTER PAGE 

I. The Temple 1 

II. The Commune . 34 

III. Plots 77 

IV. Simon 115 

V. Enigmas 162 

VI. Outside the Temple 223 

VII. At Random . 275 

VIII. Inquiries 324 



LIST OF HALFTONE ILLUSTRATIONS 

The Prisoner of the Temple .... Frontispiece 

FACING PAGE 

The Examination of the Dauphin by Dr. Pipelet . 126 

Portrait of Simon 158 

Convoy du Fils du Capet ^"^^ 

The Chateau Vitry-sur-Seine . . . . . . ^'^^ 

The Cemetery of Sainte-Marguerite .... 358 



LIST OF TEXT ILLUSTRATIONS 

PAGE 

Mezzanine Floor of the Little Tower of the Temple 13 

First Story of the Little Tower of the Temple . . 14 

Second Story of the Little Tower of the Temple . 17 

Second Story of the Big Tower of the Temple . . 18 

Third Story of the Big Tower of the Temple . . 53 

The Elevation of the Towers of the Temple . . 220 



THE DAUPHIN (Louis XVH) 
THE RIDDLE OF THE TEMPLE 



THE DAUPHIN 



THE TEMPLE 



On leaving home, as usual, on the morning of August 
10th, 1792, Fran9ois Turgy certainly never imagined 
that he was setting out on a journey which would take him 
to Switzerland, Austria, Courland and England, and 
bring him back to Paris, after a quarter of a century, 
ennobled, grown into a personage who forever would have 
a place in history. Turgy was a waiter in the King's 
kitchens. Twenty-nine years old and by birth a Parisian, 
— consequently honest and clever, — he was most attached 
to his modest office, which he had obtained in 1784. As 
he did not live at the Chateau, which was too small, in 
spite of its huge proportions, to shelter the crowd of 
functionaries of all degrees who for more than a year had 
still gravitated around the dying monarchy, he walked as 
far as the Carrousel to seek information, — and there as- 
certained that the disaster was indeed great. The guard- 
houses and out-buildings of the Chateau were on fire; the 
mob, master of the residence of the Kings of France, was 
conducting itself without restraint, throwing the furni- 
ture out of the windows and hunting the servants of the 
Court and the Swiss of the King's guard through the 
suite of salons and galleries ; whilst the royal family, re- 
nouncing the idea of facing the riot, had, since the morn- 
ing, taken refuge at the Legislative Assembly, which was 
sitting in the vast building of the Riding-school, situated 
on the edge of the terrace of the Feuillants. Turgy 

1 



THE DAUPHIN 

hastened there. A good royalist, he was most certainly 
impelled by fidelity to his masters ; but it is very probable 
that he was also desirous not to lose his place ; for, unless 
he was endowed with a prodigiously clear-sighted divina- 
tion or with a singular presumption, he could not imagine 
that the King of France, still protected by so much moral 
prestige and so large a number of ardent defenders, would 
in a few hours find himself reduced to making an appeal to 
the devotion of one of the most humble employes of his 
"Bouche" (it was thus that the important department of 
the Royal Table was designated), — an employe whose 
name and existence were certainly unknown to His 
Majesty.^ 

The approaches to the Riding-school were the scene of 
a dreadful tumult. National guards, idlers, newsmongers, 
street-orators, deputies, functionaries of all classes, and 
wild enthusiasts of every shade of opinion crowded the 
neighbouring cafes, or jostled each other at the doors 
of the Assembly, striving to force their way into the huge 
shed whence came the noise of a mighty uproar. In the 
garden, the surging crowd, at the foot of the terrace, 
seized passers-by who were suspected of royalism and 
threw them down, bruised and bleeding. The fate of the 
Revolution was being decided in the midst of this for- 
midable turmoil. In fact, the monarchy, driven from 
the palace, was not yet overthrown ; the opposing parties 
were disputing about it ; and as the Tuileries was unin- 
habitable the Assembly was engaged in seeking for a 

^It appears that Turgy signalised himself in October, 1789, at the 
time when the Queen's apartments at Versailles were invaded by the 
women from Paris, by opening in the nick of time a door of com- 
munication which enabled Marie Antoinette to reach the Salle de 
I'oeil de Boeuf by a private passage. But the part he played did 
not bring him into great prominence, for Madame de Tourzel knew 
his name but very imperfectly. She calls him Targe (Memoires, 88, 
235). Madame Royale wrote Thurg6 (MSmoire 4crit par Marie 
Thirese Charlotte de France stir la captivite des princes et princesses 
ses parents, depuis le 10 d'aout 1792, jusqu'a la mort de son fr^re, 
arrivSe le 9 de juin 1795, published by the Marquis Costa de Beaure- 
gard in accordance with the original manuscript belonging to the 
Duchess of Madrid). 



THE TEMPLE 

temporary habitation for the royal family, which it de- 
cided, in the meanwhile, to shelter in one of the narrow 
boxes^ of the Assembly haU, in order to protect it from 
the popular anger. But the Legislative, which thus held 
the royalty in its power, was itself already coming under 
the yoke of another master: a new power, indeed, bom 
during the night, was sitting at the Hotel de Ville, — 
namely, the Assembly of Commissioners whom the Paris 
sections had elected by acclamation the day before, and 
who had formed themselves into an insurrectional Com- 
mune. The legal municipality had yielded its place to it 
from seven o'clock in the morning, and the new Commune, 
intoxicated with the success of the disturbance it had 
raised, was now calling for the King's arrest, demanding 
it "in the name of the interest of the Empire, of that of 
the capital, nay in the name of the safety of Louis 
XVT."^ The Legislative was frightened: it decreed the 
"suspension" of the royal authority and ordered the de- 
partmental Administrative to prepare the Luxembourg 
Palace as a temporary residence for Louis XVI and his 
family. But this did not satisfy the Commune, which 
began to express certain fears. The Luxembourg pos- 
sessed underground passages which might offer a means 
of escape, and it would prefer the Abbaye Saint Antoine.^ 
The day was spent in these shuffling negotiations. And 
finally the King, Queen, their children and Madame 
Elizabeth were provisionally deposited at the convent of 
the Feuillants whose buildings were now being used as the 
offices of the Assembly. 

Turgy tried to get in there in order to offer his services, 
but so great was the multitude of people and so compact 

^ The box of the Lagographe or Logotachigraphe, situated, it seems, 
at one of the ends of the hall. (See on this subject Armand Brette's 
Histoire des Edifices ou ont siegS les Assemblees parlementaires de 
la Revolution, Vol. I, pp. 235-250.) 

' La Commune du 10 aout 1792 by F. Braesch, Professeur agreg6- 
d'histoire, docteur es lettres, p. 338. 

*Procbs-verbaux de la Commune de Paris, published by Maurice 
Tourneux, pp. 6 and 7. 

3 



THE DAUPHIN' 

was the crowd, to the very end of the passages, that he 
could not succeed.^ A few devoted noblemen had formed 
themselves into a barrier against the stream of those 
taking part in the demonstration and the on-lookers. 
Among them were MM. de Choiseul, de Breze, de Briges, 
de Poix, de Nantouillet, de Goguelat, d'Hervilly, de Tour- 
zel,2 de Narbonne, de la Rochefoucauld, de Saint-Par- 
doux, and de Rohan-Chabot. Madame de Tourzel, in her 
position as governess to the children of France, had not 
left the side of the royal family since its departure from 
the Tuileries. Her daughter Pauline was with her. The 
Princesse de Lamballe was also there. One after the other 
there arrived some of the Queen's attendants : Mesdames 
Thibaud, Campan, Auguie, Navarre, Basire, and Saint- 
Brice ; in addition to the valets de chamhre Hue, Thierry 
and Chamilly. All passed a sleepless night with the excep- 
tion of the little Dauphin — aged seven years and four 
months — and his thirteen-year-old sister, both of whom, 
overpowered with fatigue, slept until morning. 

For two days Turgy remained in the neighbourhood of 
the Feuillants and the Riding-school, still hoping that 
chance would enable him to find his way among the at- 
tendants who had grouped themselves around their un- 
fortunate masters. Professional anxiety appears in his 
narrative. Lost in the crowd, he was uneasy as to what 
the royal family might be eating in such a state of dis- 
order and as to the manner in which it was being waited 
upon, but was somewhat tranquillised on learning that a 
restaurant had supplied the meals. However, he re- 
mained where he was, feeling that it was there he would be 
the most accurately and most rapidly informed of the fate 

^Some were more fortunate or more adroit than Turgy, as wit- 
ness that unknown Dufour who, by chance, found himself to 
be the voluntary fourrier of the disarrayed Court and procured its 
bedding, linen and food. His narrative appeared in 1814 under the 
title: Les quatre jours de la Terreur. Detail des quatre jours que 
Louis XVI roi de France et son auguste famille fossirent h 
I'Assemblee legislative. 

'These are named by Mme. de Tourzel. Memoir es, II, 230. 

4 



THE TEMPLE 

reserved for Louis XVI until the Chateau of the Tuile- 
ries was again ready to receive him. The duel between the 
Legislative and the Commune was indeed still going on. 
The latter refused to accept the Luxembourg as the pro- 
visional asylum of "its hostages." So the Assembly chose 
the Hotel de la Chancellerie, Place Vendome. Whereupon 
the Commune advocated the Temple or the Bishop's 
Palace. To this the deputies replied by referring the 
question to a commission for examination. As they did 
not appear to be on the point of agreement, those whose 
fate was thus made a shuttlecock passed a second night in 
the cells of the Feuillants. The struggle took shape as 
follows : the Legislative Body endeavoured to save the 
King's prestige by contriving to intern him in a palace; 
on the other hand, the municipal authorities demanded a 
veritable prison for him. On August 12th, the Commune, 
tired of these evasions and usurping the prerogatives of 
its rival, exerted its authority and "decreed" that Louis 
XVI and his family should be committed to the Temple. 
It was a sort of coup d'etat, and it is curious to point out 
that the obscure history of this famous captivity opens 
with an illegality. On the morrow the Legislative gave 
way. Annulling the decree by which it had fixed its 
choice on the Hotel de la Chancellerie, it decided that the 
King and his family should be intrusted "to the safe- 
keeping and Adrtues of the citizens of Paris," and that the 
Commune should provide "without delay and under its 
responsibility for their temporary habitation." ^ 

Hardly had he made certain as to the place where the 
wreck of the monarchy was to be relegated than Turgy 
hastened to the house of M. Menard de Choussy, com- 
missioner resident of the King's household, in order to 
seek a place on the domestic staff in his capacity as 
waiter. He was received with flattering words and the 

'For the text of this decree and preceding ones, see the Marquis 
de Beaucourt's Captivity et derniers moments de Louis XVI, Vol. 
II. Official documents, under the various dates. 

5 



THE DAUPHIN 

promise of a pass to the Temple for the following day, the 
14th. Now, Turgy was mistrustful: he feared either 
that the place would be filled if he did not make haste, or 
that some difficulty would arise if he in any way pro- 
crastinated. Meeting two of his colleagues, Chretien and 
Marchand, waiters like himself, he led them to the Temple 
(already surrounded by national guards), overruled the 
orders, crossed the threshold in company with his two 
companions who walked arm in arm with him, and was 
immediately guided to the "Bouche" — or kitchen staff — 
which occupied a huge place in the left wing of the Palace. 
This happened about six o'clock in the evening.-^ 

The Temple was indeed a palace. The usual house of 
the Grand Prior and once occupied by the gallant Prince 
de Conti, but more recently by Comte d'Artois, the 
brother of Louis XVI,^ it was well adapted for a vast 
and noble residence. Its plan was somewhat similar to 
that of the Hotel Soubise, now the National Archives : a 
long courtyard, surrounded by arcades, terminating in a 
semicircle at the entrance end and closed at the other 
extremity by the principal front of the building. The 
difference between the two buildings lay in this, that in 
front of the fa9ade of the Temple there was a row of 
clipped lime-trees which, forming a wall of greenery, hid 
the low buildings situated around the courtyard. The 
apartments of the Grand Prior were extensive and rich; 
they looked on to the courtyard and, on the other front- 
age, on to a deep garden planted with tall trees set in 
lines a la franfaise. At the bottom of this garden and 
partly enclosed in parasitic buildings rose the enormous 
and robust square donjon of the Templars, more than 
fifty metres high, crowned with battlements standing out 
in relief on a slate roof and flanked with round towers at 
the cornerSj, — a black, sinister-looking building for which 

*Turgy left M. Menard de Choussy at five o'clock. 
' Comte d'Artois was not Grand Prior of the Temple, but his young 
son, the Due d'Angouleme, born in 1775, bore that title since 1776. 



THE TEMPLE 

Queen Marie Antoinette had often manifested so great an 
aversion "that she had begged Comte d'Artois a thousand 
times to have it pulled down."^ In its relentless efforts to 
obtain the Temple as a place of detention for its royal 
hostages, the insurrectional Commune had this formidable 
tower — a veritable feudal jail — in view. The Legislative 
Assembly in giving way to its domineering rival had in 
mind only the palace of the Grand Prior. Moreover, were 
the deputies, the great majority of whom were provincials 
who had arrived in Paris only a few months before, even 
acquainted with the Temple? Neither the Assembly nor 
the Commune ran the risk, for fear of a conflict, in asking 
for or furnishing particulars. But the municipal authori- 
ties had come to the determination that now that the King, 
in whom the Assembly appeared to take no longer any 
interest, was in their possession it was in the Tower they 
would imprison him. The diff'erence was worthy of note : 
in a palace the King would have remained the sovereign, 
momentarily dispossessed of his usual residence; in a 
prison he was nothing more than a criminal, already cut 
off from the world till the hour of punishment came.^ 

The palace of the Temple, uninhabitated since 1789 
and placed under seals, sheltered a certain number of the 
old servants of Comte d'Artois, and these were tolerated 
there as guardians owing to the emigration of their master. 
On the left, on entering the Palace courtyard by the Rue 

^Tourzel. M4moires, II, 233. 

^The Commune hid its plan with a skill bordering upon knavery. 
Proof of this is to be found in its reports. In that of the sitting 
of August 11th we read that the Commissioners chosen to study 
the question thought that "the King would be infinitely better (than 
at the Luxembourg) in the building situated in the garden of the 
Temple. . . ." In the report of the 12th we read: "The Temple offers 
hospitable accommodation that Louis Sixteenth, through his misfor- 
tunes, should count on from a people who wish to be severe only to be 
just." It was only after the decree of the Legislative handing over 
the royal family to the Commune that the latter, no longer fearing 
that it would be denied its prisoner, at last pulled off the mark 
and decreed that Louis Sixteenth and his family should be placed 
in the Tower of the Temple. (See Beaucourt, B II, 18 and following 
pages.) 



THE DAUPHIN 

du Temple portal, was the lodge of the former Swiss 
Gachet, who now sold drink. His wine-shop was kept 
by an old fellow who went by the name of Pere Lefebvre, 
who was himself in the power of a servant, Mere Mathieu. 
Close by this common house of refreshment were the lodg- 
ings of the door-keeper, Darque, the ex-beadle of the Grand 
Priory ; he had lived in the Temple since the distant days 
of the Prince de Conti, had seen many tilings and men, and 
considered himself a part of the house. On the right of 
the entrance, in the other rounded angle of the courtyard, 
lived Jubaud, the former porter of the Palace, and with 
him was a servant named Gourlet. Other functionaries 
of lesser importance, having also formerly worn the Grand 
Prior's livery, inhabited the out-houses : Mancel, the 
sv/eeper; Baron,^ who was intrusted with the custody of 
the seals ; Angot, the sawyer ; dame Rokenstrohe, a needle- 
woman ; and Picquet, the porter of the empty stables. In 
addition the Temple counted an inhabitant of superior 
rank: M. Berthelemy, the keeper of the arcliives of the 
Order of Templars, who lived in a building contiguous to 
the Tower and forming one body with it. Tliis building, 
of much later construction than the donjon itself," had 
been granted to M. Berthelemy in 1782 and he had ar- 
ranged it in such a way as to form a comfortable and ele- 
gant residence of four stories. Below, almost in the base- 
ment, were a kitchen and the clerks' office; above were 
dining-room and study-library; a pretty drawing-room 
with a balcony overlooking the garden, and billiard-room 
on the first floor; and at the top a bedroom and adjoining 
accommodation. This building was called the Little 
Tower because of two comer turrets which mingled its 
silhouette with that of the massive donjon and partition 
wall. 

When Turgy with his two comrades Chretien and Mar- 

^Or Le Baron. 

^Henri de Curzon, docteur es lettres, curator of the National 
Archives. La maison du Temple de Paris. 

8 



THE TEMPLE 

chand was inside the building he immediately set his wits 
to work to make himself indispensable. He asserts that 
he found "no provisions" there, and had to go out *'as 
many as three times to procure what was necessary." 
However, since the morning the Commune was preparing 
the Temple to receive its guest it had decided to treat 
him royally one last time ; a grand dinner was to be served, 
and with this object it had called in the assistance of one 
of the chefs of the "Bouche" of the Tuileries, Gagnie,^ who 
most certainly brought with him his under-cooks, 
rotisseurs, sauce-makers and scullions. In view of this 
solemn reception they had even hastily dusted and washed 
the wainscoting of the large rooms of the Palace^ and ar- 
ranged lamps to illuminate, when night came, all the build- 
ings and the whole circumference of the garden. Now, 
as the order was that the King should leave the Feuillants 
at three in the afternoon,^ it is very probable that these 
preparations were completed by six in the evening. They 
little agreed, however, with the firm intention to imprison 
the royal family in the Tower. It seems indeed that this 
plan was still kept secret. At the day sitting several 
members of the ComLmune had opposed it unsuccessfully.* 
However, Gagnie and his assistants had plenty of time 
to cook the meal, as also had Turgy and his colleagues to 
lay the table, for the procession bringing the captives 
was considerably delayed. Before leaving the Feuillants 
the list of attendants from whom Louis XVI hoped he 
would not be separated had to be discussed with Petion, 

^ He signed his name Gangnies. 

'Bill for painting done at the Temple by Watin: August 13th, for 
dusting, scouring, washing and making repairs in all the rooms on the 
ground-floor of the main building between court and garden." 
National Archives, F\ 1306. 

^ Order of the provisional Commandant General Santerre. Beau- 
court, II, 29. 

* Braesch's La Commune du 10 aoM, 1793, p. 405, note. One notices 
that, in the decree of the Commune communicated to the Legislative 
and worded as follows: "Louis Sixteenth shall be placed in the Tour 
of the Temple," the words la Tour are scratched out and replaced 
by le. 



THE DAUPHIN 

Mayor of Paris. He asked for twelve and obtained "by 
force of remonstrating" only two valets, Hue and Cha- 
miUy, and four women, Mmes. Thibaud, Auguie, Basire 
and Navarre.^ Then they had to huddle into two large 
Court coaches, to each of which only two horses were 
harnessed. Coachmen and footmen no longer wore the 
royal livery ; they were dressed in grey. In the first car- 
riage were the King, the Queen, the Dauphin, his sister, 
Mme. Elizabeth, the Princesse de Lamballe, the Marquise 
de Tourzel, her daughter Pauline, Petion, Manuel, Pro- 
curator of the Commune, and the municipal officer Col- 
ouge.^ The four women and the two valets, as well 
as two other municipal officers chosen by the General 
Council of the Commune to accompany the prisoners (one 
was Etienne Michel,^ a manufacturer of rouge, and the 
other a shoemaker working at home, Antoine Simon),* 
were in the second coach. 

It took a long time to cover the distance they had to go. 
The journey was accomplished at walking pace and not 
without the horses stopping many times, and it was not 
until about half past seven that a great noise of shouting 
in the street announced that the procession was drawing 
near to the Temple.^ Toward the end of the day the 
great courtyard had filled with members of the Commune, 
soldiers, and even unauthorised but privileged onlookers. 

' Souvenirs du baron Hue, published by Baron de Maricourt, his 
great grandson, 63 and following pages. 

* "The statement that two horses suf&ced to drag a carriage con- 
taining eleven persons will perhaps be called in question, but I guar- 
antee the authenticity of the fact." Souvenirs due baron Hue, p. 66. 
On this point Hue agrees with Mme. de Tourzel; but Pauline de 
Tourzel's narrative — Souvenirs de quarante ans — differs slightly. 

' The decree bears the name of Laiguelot, who was replaced by 
Michel. 

* Procds-verbaux de la Commune de Paris, published by Maurice 
Tourneux, p. 14. 

^ As regards the hour of arrival at the Temple the narratives of 
eye-witnesses disagree. "Seven o'clock," writes Madame Royale. — 
"A quarter past eight," according to Mme. de Tourzel. — "The day was 
beginning to decline," notes Pauline de Tourzel. — La Chronique de 
Paris, quoted by Beaucourt, I, 31 note, says "about three o'clock." 
As to Baron Hue, he inadvertently places the event on August 14th. 

10 



THE TEMPLE 

The commanding officer of the national guard was the first 
to appear, on horseback; and certain persons noticed 
that he made an interrogative sign to the municipal officers 
grouped on the steps: "Was the Tower ready?" The 
municipaux replied by another sign: "No, not yet.'* 
And as the coaches had stopped in the middle of the court- 
yard an order was given to open the doors. Whereupon 
some gunners began pushing and shoving, wishing to 
separate the King from his family and lead him away to 
the donjon immediately.-^ Petion interposed; there was 
a great uproar; and among the crowd of municipal offi- 
cers, all of whom had their hats on and wore the tricolour 
ribbon crosswise and the cockade,^ the emblem of their 
new rank, the prisoners stepped out of the carriages and 
were led to the salons of the Palace. The Queen hoped 
to find some seclusion there, but was doomed to disappoint- 
ment, for the anteroom, guard-room and billiard-room, 
which had to be passed through to reach the big central 
drawing-room, a vast room with ten windows, were filled 
with municipaux, — artisans or shopkeepers for the most 
part who had never before been in so sumptuous a house. 
Puffed up with their importance, they had made them- 
selves entirely at home, but their good breeding was not 
on a level with the assurance which they made a point of 
showing. Either because they had not thought fit to 
change their everyday clothes, or because they had put 
on the best things they had, they were nevertheless so 
different from the men in whose company the Queen and 
her ladies were accustomed to live that the latter con- 

^Memorial written by Marie Therese Charlotte of France regarding 
the captivity of the princes and princesses, her relatives, from August 
10th, 1792, until her brother's death, on June 9th, 1795. 

'Account from Mme. Michel, a dealer in ribbons, No. 50 Rue aux 
Fers, for goods supplied by her in accordance with orders given on 
August 11th and 12th, as follows: 351 ells of tricolour ribbon at 45 
sous; 250 wool cockades at 6 sous: 871 livres. Statement of sums paid 
by the treasurer of the Paris Commune on behalf of the General 
Council. M^moires sur les journees de septembre by Baudouin, 1823, 
p. 308. Another similar bill for goods supplied later, August 2Ist. 

11 



THE DAUPHIN 

sidered them "clothed in the most dirty and most disgust- 
ing of costumes.^ 

The King retained his good nature and simplicity. 
These people spoke to him without uncovering, called him 
Monsieur affectedly, and asked him "a thousand questions 
each one more ridiculous than the last."^ But nothing 
offended him, satisfied at having arrived and finding the 
residence to his taste. Convinced that he was going to 
inhabit it, he asked to be shown over the place, whereupon 
the municipal officers hastened to comply with his wish. 
He went through the whole house, taking a pleasure in 
allotting the various apartments beforehand. Nobody 
undeceived him. Perhaps no one dared to inform him 
that he would be imprisoned in the Tower which could be 
perceived over there, above the trees, gray and gigantic 
in the dusk; perhaps certain of them still hesitated and 
were secretly ashamed of the premeditated blackguardism. 
For the donjon was uninhabitable. Mayor Petion was 
one of them. After having personally got a clear idea 
of this most inhuman piece of villainy, he refused to be a 
party to it. He left the Temple about ten o'clock at 
night, ^ proceeded to the Hotel de Ville, reported to the 
Commune the transfer of the royal family, and concluded 
by confessing that the Tower not being properly ar- 
ranged "he had not considered it his duty to comply with 
the decree of the previous day and had authorized resi- 
dence at the Palace." The Commune, implacable, replied 



^Tourzel. 

'Tourzel. 

"'Potion went away, Manuel remained." (Madame Royale.) How- 
ever, the report of the night sitting of the Commune of August 13th 
says positively: "The mayor went to the General Council with the 
Procurator of the Commune." Manuel, then, accompanied Potion to 
the Hotel de Ville. However, he was back at the Temple for the 
King's dinner, which took place, it seems, about half past ten or 
eleven o'clock. We may conclude that it was Manuel who, after 
having accompanied the mayor to the Hotel de Ville, carried back 
to the Temple the formal order to imprison the King in the Tower. 

12 



THE TEMPLE 

by ordering that the decision concerning the Tower be 
maintained."^ 

At that late hour, M. Berthelemy, the archivist of the 
Order of Malta, domiciled in the Little Tower, heard a 




MEZZANINE FLOOR OF THE LITTLE TOWER OF THE TEMPLS 

(Apartment of M. Berthelemy) 

A. Part of the stone stairway, the only means of communication between 
the Big and the Little Tower. B. Wooden stairway connecting the three stories 
of the Little Tower. O. Former workroom of M. Berthelemy, now the dining- 
room of the royal family. D. Study of M. Berthelemy. 

great noise in his staircase. An instant later his drawing- 
room was full of people. "What did they want.?" he 
asked. — "He must remove," was the reply. "The King, 
»Beaudouin, pp. 180-183. 

13 



THE DAUPHIN 

Queen, their children, and suite, fourteen persons in 

all, without counting the guardians, were going to 

spend the night there. Everything must be evacuated in 




FIRST STORY OP THE LITTLE TOWER OF THE TEMPLE 
(Apartment of M, Berthfilemy) 

E. Billiard (or bedroom) of M. Berthfilemy. It was here that The Dauphin 
and Mme. de Tourzel passed the night of the 13th of August, 1792. F. Room in 
which Mme. de Lamballe was placed. G. The Queen's chamber. It was here 
that the little prisoner died, June 8, 1795. (See below, Chapter VI, Outside the 
Temple.) H. Wardrobe. In this closet which had no opening except a loophole 
opening on the stone stairway Tison was placed in secret from November, 1793 
to December, 1795. (See below, Chapter V, Enigmas.) L. Water-closet. 

an hour's time." The distracted archivist implored and 
discussed, but nobody would pay heed to him. Labourers 
were already loading his furniture on their shoulders and 
disappearing down the stone staircase. Where was all 

14 



THE TEMPLE 

this to be put? Darque, the ex-beadle, who had the key 
of the neighbouring unused church, proposed that the 
furniture be housed there provisionally, so the dining- 
room table and chairs were transported there. Whilst 
Berthelemy was rushing from library to cellar, hesitating 
whether to save first of all his beautiful books or his old 
bottles, a counter-order came forbidding the continuation 
of the work.^ Not only must no furniture be removed, 
but additional pieces must be brought in, and these were 
being carried out of the Palace of the Temple at that very 
moment. Soon two handcarts loaded with mattresses 
and forty coverlets arrived;^ and in the midst of tumult- 
uous disorder occasioned by this removal, complicated by 
the moving in of other articles, there was a constant 
passing to and fro of commissioners, workmen, and 
soldiers, who took possession of the building and forbade 
the enraged archivist to enter. Possessing but the clothes 
on his back, he wandered the whole night through the city, 
seeking a shelter, disconsolate and yet still incredulous of 
the misfortune which had befallen him. 

Meanwhile, the "reception" at the Temple Palace was 
continued as a gala. Illumination-lamps were burning on 
the fa9ade of all the buildings, on the donjon itself, and 
also on the embattled walls of the gardens.^ In the salon 
called "the salon of the four mirrors," illuminated by "an 
infinite number of candles,"* the table had been laid for 
dinner. Awaiting the delayed meal, the crowd was still 
great, and the Queen, her daughter, the Princesse de Lam- 
balle and Mme. de Tourzel were manifestly offended by 
promiscuousness with these rough-mannered revolution- 
aries. The little Dauphin, who the whole time whilst 
passing through the stormy and threatening streets of 

^Papers of M. Berthelemy, communicated by Mme. Gustave Blavot. 
See also La Petite Tour du Temple by L. Chanoine-Dauranches, 
Rouen, 1904. 

'Statement of sums, etc., Beaudouin. 

'Hue's Souvenirs de quarante ans. 

*Tourzel. This large salon is the one depicted in B. M. Ollivier's 
picture, "Le The k I'Anglaise," now in the Louvre. 

15 



THE DAUPHIN 

Paris "turned his eyes in all directions to see the innumer- 
able people,"^ was now exhausted and so very sleepy that 
he asked Mme. de Tourzel if they Avould not soon be 
going to bed. Several times she made enquiries and asked 
to be shown to the apartment reserved for the young 
prince, but received the reply that the room was not 
ready. So she laid the child on a sofa, where he fell 
asleep immediately. The King showed patience and 
readily conversed with the municipal officers who were 
there. One of them, lying on a sofa, "made the most 
strange remarks to him on the happiness of equality." 
Louis XVI listened and then asked : "What is your call- 
ing.'"' — "That of a shoemaker," replied the man. It 
was indeed Antoine Simon, who, elected on August 9th by 
the Theatre-Fran9ais section, had been chosen by the new- 
bom Commune to represent it in the royal procession and 
who had been seen to take his place in the femmes de 
chambre^s coach. He was at the outset of his political 
career, which was to be short but notorious. Another 
man, very different in bearing, affected a most free and 
easy behaviour toward the King and in speaking to him 
continually repeated that title of Monsieur^ which others, 
less polite, used with timidity. His name was Germain 
Truchon, one of the important leaders of the Gravilliers 
section. He called himself an advocate and man of letters, 
but he was usually designated by the nickname of the 
"Man with the Long Beard," on account of the abnormal 
hairy growth descending from his cheeks and chin to his 
thighs. He spoke well, however, expressed himself with 
propriety and "appeared to have received some educa- 
tion."3 

* Letter from Coray to Dimitrio Lotos, protopsalle of Smyrna, 
pp. 164-166, quoted by Beaucourt, I, 39. 

'Hue. 

'Tourzel. Mme. de Tourzel adds: "Truchon was a bad character. 
He was accused of bigamy and had a sentence against him." We have 
not been able to find any record of the sentence; but as regards 
the accusation of bigamy, Mme. de Tourzel was well informed. The 
"Man with the Long Beard" was, in fact, the author of a pamphlet 

16 



THE TEMPLE 

At last, at ten o'clock at night, dinner was served.* 
Turgy, Marchand and Chretien carried out their duties ; 
whilst Manuel, the Procurator of the Commune, remained 




SECOND STORY OF THE LITTLE TOWER OF THE TEMPLE 
(Apartment <rf M. Bertheiemy) 

M. Room of Louis XVI. N. Bath room. O. Workroom. P. Room trans- 
formed into a guard-house during the first days of the captivity, after which Hue 
and Chamilly, valets de chambre of the King slept here. R. Kitchen where Mme. 
Elizabeth and Pauline de Tourzel were installed in primitive fashion. S. Closet. 

standing by the side of the King's chair. The meal was 
a long and silent one. "They made a pretence of eating 

in which he protested against that false charge. See Tourneux's 
Bibliogra/phie de Vhistoire de Paris pendant le Revolution, IV, No. 
25617. 
'Hue. 

17 



THE DAUPHIN 

for form's sake"^ and the Dauphin, whom they had had to 
wake up, fell asleep again so profoundly at the very first 




SECOND STORY OF THE BIG TOWER OF THE TEMPLE 
(Apartment of the King) 
A. Wooden door. B. Iron door. C. Anteroom. D. Stove, now pre- 
served in the donjon of Vincennes. E. Room of Louis XVI from Sept., 1792 
to January, 1793. This was the room in which Simon and his wife stayed from 
July, 1793 to January, 1794. F. Chimney arranged in the embrasure of the 
window. G. Oratory. H. Dining-room separated from the anteroom by glazed 
partition. It was in this apartment that Louis received his family in the evening 
on the 20th of January, 1793. J. Woodhouse. L. Clery's room. M. Corridor 
leading to the water-closets. N. Water-closets. 

spoonfuls of soup, that Mme, de Tourzel took him on her 
knees, where he continued his nocturnal repose. About 
eleven o'clock a municipal" informed the governess that the 

* Tourzel. 

*The members of the Commune are, ordinarily, so named in the 
majority of the narratives. Contemporaries do not seem to have 
made any distinction between these two terms which they use in- 

T O 

io 



THE TEMPLE 

heir apparent*s room was ready for him, and immediately 
taking the child in his arms he carried him away so rapidly 
that the Marquise and Mme. de Saint-Brice had difficulty 
in following liim. The man crossed three salons and en- 
tered a very long passage which Mme. de Tourzel, in her 
emotion, took to be an underground way, but which was 
nothing more than the long covered gallery of 35 toises 
(68 metres) joining the Palace to the Tower, and which 
had formerly served the Prince de Conti as library and 
museum. Half way down this passage it formed an angle 
and then continued narrower,^ to the donjon. At last the 
municipal with the sleeping prince and the two anguish- 
stricken women entered a lofty Gothic room and im- 
mediately turned aside to enter a broad winding stone 
staircase, which, after a few steps, was followed by another 
staircase, also of stone, curved and narrow. Then came 
a landing and still another staircase, this time of wood, 
and at the top one was on the first floor of the Little 
Tower, in the billiard-room^ of the Archivist Berthelemy. 
The room was four metres long by three metres broad and 
the ceiling was low. The furniture included some arm- 
chairs upholstered in blue and white Utrecht velvet, a cir- 
cular sofa, a rose-wood chiffonier, and a large Boule desk. 
Hanging on the walls were a few gallant engravings. Van 
Loo's Bain de Diane and his Coucher, — in addition to 
others in gilt frames. Luxury in the eyes of a middle- 
class bachelor who liked comfort and was not lacking in 
taste, but destitution in the eyes of whoever was bom at 

diflFerently, as well as that of "municipal officer." This distinction 
was, however, not without interest, but it was indeed a subtle one, 
and we shall not venture to take it into account in these pages. On 
this subject see Braesch, op. cit. 

^ Almost three metres broad in its first part, the gallery measured 
barely two metres in the neighbourhood of the Tower. — Curzon's La 
Maison du Temple. It is probable that, as happened to Hue, Mme. 
de Tourzel, following the Dauphin, went along this corridor by the 
light of a simple lantern, which explains her error. 

' Madame Royale writes, in fact, "the billiard-room," but other nar- 
ratives mention the room as having been the archivist's bedroom. It 
is certain that the billiard-room properly so called was elsewhere. 

19 



THE dauphin: 

Versailles and had just left the Tuileries. Two folding 
beds had been put up : one for the Dauphin, the other for 
Mme. de Tourzel, who asked no questions, spoke not a word 
but at once put the prince to bed, after which she sat 
down by his side, wrapped in gloomy thought. About one 
o^clock in the morning^ the Queen entered. Taking the 
governess' hands in hers, she said: "Did I not tell you?" 
Then she drew near to her son's small mean couch and for 
a long time gazed on the deeply slumbering child of the 
King of France. Tears came into the mother's eyes, but 
she quickly recovered herself, since it was necessary to see 
to the installation of fourteen people in that cramped 
residence. Some lady's-maids, sent by Petion, presented 
themselves ; but the Queen sent them away ; "not able to 
support the presence of strangers she preferred to arrange 
everything herself." ^ She was to sleep in the salon next to 
the Dauphin's room ; M. Berthelemy's bed had been carried 
there; and she had a camp-bed put up for her daughter. 
A small room without a window separated the two rooms, 
and there Mme. de Lamballe was lodged. The King in- 
stalled himself on the upper floor, composed of a bedroom 
with an alcove which Hue and Chamilly had hastily pre- 
pared for him^ and a kitchen, where Madame Elizabeth 
and Pauline de Tourzel were to find what room they could. 

Louis XVI went to bed and slept peacefully. His two 
valets passed the night sitting by his bedside. Pauline 
and Princess Elizabeth never closed their eyes the whole 
night, the small airless room which separated their kitchen 
from the King's bedroom having been transformed into a 
guard-room, where the occupants talked and laughed until 
dawn. 

The next day the prisoners devoted themselves to or- 
ganisation. In the light of a summer day the apartment 
of the Little Tower assumed a less glooiny appearance. 

*The hour given by Madame Royale in her narrative. 

'Madame Royale. 

•Hue. 

20 



THE TEMPLE 

Most of the rooms were elegantly decorated and furnished ; 
on each floor was a wardrobe ; and behind the King's room 
was a bath-room with mirrors and seats — a veritable bou- 
doir, secluded and gallant.^ The difficulty of living to- 
gether in these cramped spaces devoid of back-staircases 
and adjoining accommodation remained, and all the more 
so because, apart from the royal family and suite, it had 
also been necessary to find room for the municipal guards 
and on the threshold of every door one encountered a sen- 
tinel. But this was only a temporary arrangement. 
Louis XVI was now aware that the Great Tower was to 
be his residence. And he wished to visit it. Everything 
there remained to be done, the four floors being entirely 
bare, with the exception of one of them, where, piled on 
the flagstones or arranged on shelves, were thousands 
upon thousands of boxes and bundles forming the archives 
of the Order of Malta. Apart from this accumulation of 
old parchments, nothing but bare walls ; on each story a 
single room with an area of sixty-five metres and an arched 
Gothic ceiling springing from a massive central pillar ; on 
each side two windows at the end of a large interior em- 
brasure, which bore witness to the enormous thickness of 
the walls ; and on a level with each of the rooms three 
circular cabinets enclosed in the comer turrets and lit 
by narrow loopholes. The fourth turret contained the 
staircase leading to the top of the building where there 
was a loft surrounded by a pathway around which was a 
crenellated parapet.^ To make this feudal fortress habi- 
table the Commune had chosen an experienced con- 
tractor, the "patriot" Palloy, then celebrated through the 
destruction of the Bastille, and who, by a singular change, 
after having pulled down the ancient symbolic prison, not 
without glory and profit, found himself called upon to 
arrange another whose fame was to be still more tragic. 

*M. Berthelemy's papers, Carnavalet Museum, and information 
from Mme. Gustave Blavot. See also Chanoine-Davranches' La 
Petite Tour du Temple. 

^H. de Curzon's La Maison du Temple. 

21 



THE DAUPHIN 

Meanwhile, arrangements at the Little Tower proceeded. 
A bed for the Dauphin^ was brought from an upholsterer's 
named Masson: a white wood couch with a high head- 
board and hangings of white cretonne patterned with pink 
roses. ^ Then utensils for the table or household, paper 
and cards, a bath for the little prince, had to be obtained. 
The Queen received a gold watch, supplied by Breguet at 
a cost of 960 livres.^ The royal family had arrived at 
the Temple destitute of everything.* They were in need 
of linen and clothes, and tradesmen flocked to the place. 
The King ordered a dark coloured dress-coat made of fine 
cloth, kerseymere breeches of various colours, some 
stitched dimity jackets, gray silk stockings, trousers of 
white dimity, buckled shoes, ^ and also "some of taffeta for 
the feet, a face sponge, a sponge for the teeth (call at 
Dubois', dentist), several skins for the legs (at Daille's, 
surgeon, Rue du Pot-de-Fer), six razors and toilet scis- 
sors, an instrument for lacing and unlacing brodekins, 
and some breeches linings."^ Thirty dressmakers, milli- 
ners, sempstresses and embroiderers worked incessantly. 
They had to make pierrots of pink and white, blue and 
white cotton cambric; a pierrot of toile de Jouy; a 
chemise-frock with a collar; a frockcoat of Florence taf- 
feta, of the colour called houe de Paris, fastened in front, 
and provided with a watch-pocket ; white silk stockings ; 
a taffeta neckerchief "which can be tied behind"; lawn 
caps trimmed with narrow lace; lawn sleeves and collars 
for the cotton dimity dresses ; deep blue shoes, others in 
gray, and others again of puce-coloured, blue and gray 
taffeta;'^ and a pair of Chinese sabots. Hatters and mil- 

^ National Archives, F 4, 1036. 

* This bed still exists; it belonged, some years ago, to Dr. P 

^ Papiers du Temple. Nouvelle Revue, April 1st, 1883. 

* When the prisoners reached the Temple they had only the clothes 
in which they were standing." General Council of the Commune, 
October 1792, Beaucourt II, 126. 

° Louis XVI's ordinary tailors were Bosquet & Darget ; his 
shoemaker, Giot, Rue du Bac. 
'National Archives, A. A. 53, 1486. 
^ Supplied to the Queen by Effling, shoemaker, for 84 livres. 

22 



THE TEMPLE 

liners were as busy as bees. Poupart, Eloffe and Mme. 
Bertin brought to the Tower marmottes (kerchiefs tied 
under the chin), fanchons (other head coverings), felt 
hats, and "a jockey-shaped hat of black castor." One of 
these millinery creations must have been particularly at- 
tractive, for Madame Elizabeth asked for "a hat similar 
to the Queen's."^ There is an account for 1961 Uvres 17 
sols for "silk materials supplied to the Temple by Barbier 
and Tetard, Rue des Bourdonnais" ;^ whilst the bills of 
Prevost & Laboullee for scent amount to 551 Uvres. . . .^ 
These accounts evoke less the idea of detention which was 
never to end than that of a fashionable lady reduced to 
spending a season in isolation and who means to give up 
not a single one of her habits of luxury. It seems as if, 
especially in the case of Marie Antoinette, there sub- 
sisted for some time a sort of incomprehension of the situa- 
tion in which she stood ; and is it astonishing that, having 
fallen from so great a height, she was not immediately 
conscious of the depth of the abyss ? The repeated blows 
of relentless misfortune were necessary in order that dig- 
nity, resignation, greatness of soul should compose for 
the prisoner of the Temple an imperishable diadem more 
imposing than the crown she had just lost. 

During two months these orders never ceased. We note 
in these accounts, pell-mell, a dining-room suite, tables, 
comer-buffets, dumb-waiters, a filter and various domestic 
objects; toys for the Dauphin, such as balloons "some- 
what large," a whipping-top and its whip, a set of nine- 
pins, two pairs of rackets, twelve kites, draughts and 
dominoes. One must also note the fourteen volumes of 
the Missel et Breviawe de Paris for Louis XVI and the 
like number of prayer-books for Princess Elizabeth. 
Shop-keepers profited by this piece of good luck; there 
was nothing democratic in their prices, since each pair of 

' Papiers du Temple, loc. cit. The price of a hat did not exceed 
50 to 60 Uvres. 
'¥\ 1310. 
»F*, 1310 and 1311. 

23 



THE DAUPHIN 

silk stockings for the King cost 24 livres, those for the 
Queen 33 livres, whilst corsets were 84 to 120 livres, — 
and one pair even 148 livres. A small knife with a tor- 
toise-shell handle and a gold blade was bought for the 
Dauphin for 160 livres.^ 

On August 12th the Legislative Assembly had voted 
that a sum of 500,000 livres be granted the King for the 
expenses of his household until the day on which the 
National Convention met, and it was from this half-a-mil- 
lion in expectation that the sums necessary for the instal- 
lation of the royal family were deducted. But as this 
liberality was long in being realized and as certain pur- 
veyors demanded payment, Hue sacrificed 600 livres with 
which he was provided and Petion personally advanced 
2,000 livres" in order to appease the most impatient. 
Moreover, the claims of the prisoners appeared to the 
commissioners of the Commune to be excessive exigencies ; 
these men of the people could not realise that the habits of 
the royal family made that which to them was a scandal- 
ous superfluity an absolute necessity. "A fine book is to be 
written," said Fievee, "on the inequality of conditions." 
The municipal officers likewise took fright and became 
uneasy at the marks of respect shown to the prisoners by 
the faithful servants by whom they were still surrounded- 
Was not this an indication of some counter-revolutionary 
manifestation? The commissioners on duty on August 
14th were a gardener of the Rue Plumet, named Dewaux, 
a boarding-house keeper, Oger, a wig-maker, Donnay, 
living in the Rue Saint-Charles, and a certain Ollivant 
whose calling is not mentioned.^ One can understand that 
these inexperienced stewards were appalled at the re' 

^ Papier s du Temple and Beaucourt II, 127. The majority of the' 
accounts are in the National Archives, F*, 1304 and 1314. 

° General Council of the Commune, night sitting of November 5th, 
1792. Beaucourt, II, 112. 

^ These are the names of the commissioners mentioned in the report 
of the August 13ih evening sitting of the Commune; but at this same 
meeting, later, four other commissioners were appointed to be on 
duty at the Temple. 



THE TEMPLE 

sponsibility incumbent upon them and embarrassed to 
approach as masters that King of France who, but the 
day before, was separated from their lowness by so in- 
commensurable a distance. The impromptu part they 
had to play presented many risks. It was asserted that 
certain troubles had broken out in Paris in the course of 
the night ;^ it was perhaps to be feared that the royalists 
were plotting the abduction of the King and his family; 
the Temple was badly defended, invaded by a crowd of 
soldiers, onlookers, purveyors and workmen whom the 
anxious-minded commissioners suspected of being con- 
spirators. It was necessary, too, that the prisoners 
should move about among this throng. They had, in fact, 
at meal times, to go from the Tower to the Palace ; it had 
been arranged that every day their table should be laid 
in the central salon of the Grand Prior's residence; ^ and 
then, if the weather was fine, they walked in the garden 
the walls of which, already pierced with large gaps for the 
passage of rubbish-carts, Palloy, who worked ostentatious- 
ly but without method, was demolishing. All these move- 
ments made surveillance almost illusory, and all the more 
so since no regulations had yet been established. 

Now, since the beginning of the Revolution, and espe- 
cially since the Varennes event, the idea of the flight and 
abduction of the King, Queen and Dauphin had haunted 
every mind; it was the nightmare of revolutionaries and 
the secret consolation of royalists ; a state of mind which 
was to persist after the death of Louis XVI and give 
rise to a number of fictions. As regards the young 
Prince, many people already whispered that, long before 
the imprisonment in the Temple, the real Dauphin had 

^General (Council of the Commune, sitting of August 14th. — "The 
sitting opened by . . . the account given by M. . Santerre of some 
events which took place during the night. . . ." Beaucourt II, 31. 

^In spite of many contradictory indications, we must be satisfied 
here with Turgy's affirmation, well placed as he was to be informed on 
this point: — "the royal family continued to take its meals in this 
room until the Big Tower became their (sic) sole habitation." That 
is to say until October 25th. 

25 



THE DAUPHIN 

been put by his parents in a place of safety and that a 
substituted child played his part at the Court. Whether 
these fables sprang up spontaneously in the popular im- 
agination, ever eager for romance and mystery, or whether 
they are based upon vague abortive plans, a few traces of 
them subsist in certain writings of the period. Without 
wasting time over the version according to which the son 
of Louis XVI was, in 1790, taken to Canada under the 
care of a Scotch lawyer, Mr. Oack, whilst another child 
of his own age, named Laroche, a native of Toulouse, re- 
placed him at the Tuileries^ — an extravagant adventure 
which has been accepted as true by some credulous folk, it 
must be noted that, at the beginning of 1792, at the Demo- 
phile Society, "in the presence of three thousand enraged 
Jacobins," an occasional speaker revealed the fact that 
"the King exhibited daily a child who bore a striking re- 
semblance to Monsieur le Dauphin, the object of this 
stratagem being to abduct the young Prince."^ An echo 
of this is to be found in the Correspondance secrete, under 
the date June 18th, 1792. The writer relates that Louis 

XVI was sometimes subject to "absence of mind," 

that "recently he did not recognize his son and on seeing 
him advance toward him asked who the child was."^ 

Another attestation appears perhaps a little less fan- 
tastic, although it comes from the most prolific of our 
novelists. In the preface to the Fiances de la Mort, Vi- 
comte d'Arlincourt relates that Marie Antoinette, "having 
constantly harboured the secret idea of saving her son 
from the cannibals who lay in wait for him," decided — in 
1791 — to get him abroad. It was agreed that Mme. 
d'Arlincourt, in retirement at the Chateau de Merantais, 
near Versailles, should substitute for the Dauphin her own 
son, — the future author of Solitaire, — who, born on 

^See Louis XVII au Canada in the Nouvelle Revue, Vol. VI, 
No. 24. 

"National Archives, C 190. Papers of CoUenot d'Angremont. 

^Correspondance secrete relating to Louis XVI and Marie An- 
toinette, published by Lescure, II, 600. 

26 



THE TEMPLE 

January 31st, 1787, was, if not the same age, at least the 
same height as the heir apparent. She was then to leave 
immediately for the Pyrenean watering places, accom- 
panied by the Dauphin, who would pass as her cliild and 
cross the Spanish frontier with her. The day of depart- 
ure was fixed. The Queen herself was to bring the heir 
to the throne to Merantais and enter the park by a door, 
called the Porte de Marmusson, which opened at a distance 
on to the country. Everything was prepared for the suc- 
cess of this enterprise, but at the last moment the Queen 
lacked courage.^. . . Nothing in all this is worthy of 
being commented upon, but it is not without utility to 
collect this gossip circulated at the dawn of the Revolution 
— gossip in which is to be found, perhaps, the origin of so 
many other still more clumsy falsehoods which for more 
than a century obscured the legend of the unfortunate 
child whose mysterious story has up to now baffled all at- 
tempts at elucidation. 

Tormented by this charming tittle-tattle, the Commune 
was by no means reassured by the early reports of its 
delegates at the Temple, consequently it issued decree 
after decree, striving to cover its responsibility in case the 
prisoners should be snatched out of its hands. On the 
13th it decided that all the persons in attendance on the 
King and his family should be dismissed, that the prisoners 
should no longer be surrounded by any other servants than 
those chosen by the Mayor and the Procurator of the 
Commune. This order was announced to the prisoners the 
next day during their dinner.^ The King flew into a pas- 
sion, protesting that if they persisted in depriving him 
of the only friends left him, he and his family would wait 
upon themselves. The municipal officers^ withdrew with- 
out insisting.^ The same day the Commune decreed that 
the door-keeper of the Temple, Jubaud, should be dis- 

^Alfred Marquiset's Le Vicomte d'Arlincourt. 
'Recits de Madame Royale. 
^Michel and Simon. 
*Baron Hue's Souvenirs. 

rt 



THE DAUPHIN 

missed ; that the citizens placed on guard at the Tower, 
"should be chosen by the sections, which would make cer- 
tain of their patriotism"; that those of its members ap- 
pointed each day to go to the Temple "should make a 
daily report of their mission" ; that two of these commis- 
sioners "should be specially attached to the person of 
Louis XVI and communicate with no other person than 
he"; and that there should be formed at the Temple "a 
committee to keep an eye on everything that happened and 
decide in cases that might occur. "^ 

On the night of August 19th the King had retired to 
rest, and Hue and Chamilly had just stretched themselves 
side by side on the mattress which was their bed in common 
when the door of their narrow cell was thrown open and a 
voice demanded: "Are you the valets?" They replied ii\ 
the affirmative. Thereupon thej' were ordered to come 
downstairs immediately. On reaching the little room 
preceding the Queen's bedroom, and where Mme. de Lam- 
balle slept, they found the latter and Mme. de Tourzel 
already ready to depart. The Queen was holding them 
in her arms. In order not to leave the little sleeping 
Prince alone, they dragged his bed, without awakening 
him, into his mother's room. Meanwhile Madame Eliza- 
beth arrived from the second story bringing with her 
Pauline de Tourzel, whom the commissioners also de- 
manded. Then the three lady's-maids, lodged on the 
lower story, arrived. Only the King, whom the noise, 
however, had awakened, did not leave liis room. Little 
Madame Royale was quite dumbfounded. Once more 
everybody embraced. It was time to depart. By the 
light of a few lanterns the expelled ones crossed the garden 
and reached the door of the Palace of the Temple. Cabs 
were waiting for them in the courtyard; and with gerir 
darmes as an escort they set off for the Hotel de Ville.^ 

^General Council of the Commune: sittings of August 13th, 14th 
and 17th. Beaucourt, II, pp. 30-33. 

^ Hue's Souvenirs, Ricits de Madame Boyale, and Memoires dc 
Mme. de Tourzel. 

S8 



THE TEMPLE 

Hue returned to the Temple at nine o'clock in the 
morning and resumed his duties. The others, under lock 
and key at the Force prison, were never to appear again. 
This rigorous measure caused the royal prisoners great 
embarrassment. Louis XVI, in truth, appeared to take 
things cheerfully. He even summoned the architect 
Palloy, declaring that "now they were no longer incom- 
moded," and as there were not "so many people there," 
it became useless to continue the fitting up of another 
apartment in the Big Tower. Palloy, little disposed 
to be deprived of his contract from which he was count- 
ing on deriving a big profit, haughtily replied "that 
he took orders only from the Commune." ^ This 
body, whose fears seemed to increase hourly, showed 
its anxiety by promulgating decrees incessantly. It 
exacted that the guard at the Temple be relieved daily; 
that not merely four but eight^ members should watch 
over the prisoners, who were to be left neither during the 
day nor the night. They were to keep an exact account 
of the slightest incidents. Nobody was to enter the 
Temple without being provided with a card, on which was 
printed the word Surete, and a model of which was to be 
posted up in all sentry-boxes and guard-rooms. The card 
with which members of the Commune would be provided 
was to bear, in addition to two seals, the words Officier 
municipal printed diagonally, and nobody was to enter 
the prisoners' residence unless his card bore the special 
vise Pour le Tour.^ But this was not all. "The Temple 
garden shall be closed to all persons whatsoever with the 
exception of the adjutant and the officer on duty." In 
addition, as they could not forbid the prisoners to take 
an airing, they thought it prudent to pen them up, at the 
hour for walking, "in a very limited enclosure made of 

^Madame Royale. 

^ General Council of the Commune, sitting of August 20th. 

* General Council of the Commune, sitting of August 28th. 

29 



THE DAUPHIN 

planks,"^ until Palloy had finished the high walls he was 
building. And when, after devoting a fortnight to the 
making of these most precautionary regulations the 
General Council of the Commune heard one of its members 
announce that conspirators "were forming a plan to ab- 
duct the family of the tyrant," it sought in vain for some 
new means of strengthening its surveillance and covering 
its responsibility. 

The commissioners lived in perpetual alarm. "So 
guilty did they feel themselves," writes Madame Royale, 
"that they took fright at everything." One day, in the 
neighbourhood of the Tower, a soldier, to try his gun, 
discharged it in the air. He was arrested and put through 
a long interrogation.^ Had he not made a signal.'* A 
report of the event was drawn up. On a certain evening, 
at dinner-time, a cry of "To arms !" was heard. This 
time it was "strangers who were approaching to deliver 
the tyrant." The turnkey of the Tower drew his sword 
and said to Louis XVI: "If they arrive I shall kill you." 
On an inquiry being made it was found that the whole 
thing was due to "a confusion on the part of a patrol." 
On another occasion, when Palloy's workmen set to work 
to remove the gate of the Rotonde, the municipal officers 
and the guard rushed up, thinking that the population 
was storming the place, and the workmen were dispersed. 
The prisoners' obsession equalled that of their jailers. The 
former feared separation, ever menacing, and especially 
that the Dauphin would be taken from them. Notwith- 
standing their repugnance, the King and Queen forced 
themselves to take part in the daily promenade, not daring 
to let their son go out in the garden alone, "for fear of 
giving the gunners the idea of seizing him."^ Thus, on 
one side and on the other, among those who gave orders as 
among those who resigned themselves, at the Commune 

^Souvenirs de quarante ans, by the Comtesse de B6arn (Pauline de 
Tourzel). 

^Madame Royale. 
'Tourzel. 

30 



THE TEMPLE 

as among the people of Paris, in the royalists' camp as 
well as in that of the revolutionary party, the idea of 
escape or abduction hovered over the Tower of the Temple 
from the first days, so inadmissible did it appear to the 
whole of France that her King could be a captive in his 
capital without any attempt being made to deliver him. 
Above all, the anxious interest of the country was centred 
on the fair head of the Dauphin, who had committed no 
fault, merited no reproach, whom no law condemned, and 
yet who was paying the penalty, — an apprehension al- 
ready biting like remorse and which, prolonged for three 
years, was to multiply into painful perplexities for a 
century and more. For history, which was forbidden to 
speak of him, will take its revenge later; the life of this 
child will provoke in posterity more curiosity and will 
suscitate more chroniclers than that of great conquerors, 
powerful monarchs, or famous legislators. 

To close these preliminary remarks, it is advisable to 
ascertain precisely what the composition of the Temple 
staff was toward the end of the first month of the 
captivity. Hue, arrested once and returned, as we have 
seen, by the Commune, continued his duties for only a few 
days : he left the Tower on September 2nd. On the other 
hand, Clery, the valet attached to the Dauphin since the 
prince's birth, called, on August 24th, on Petion and 
begged the favour of being allowed to resume his duties 
with his young imprisoned master. The request was 
granted and he returned to the Temple two days later. At 
that time Clery was thirty-three years old. A few years 
before he had married Marie Elizabeth Duverger, a musi- 
cian in the King's orchestra and at the Court oratorios. 
To assume his painful and perilous task Clery abandoned 
his wife and several children. Sir Walter Scott, who knew 
him in England, relates that "Clery's manners were easy 
and distinguished."^ 
^Life of Na/poleon Bonaparte, II, 163. 

81 



THE DAUPHIN 

In the early days of his detention, Louis XVI had asked 
for "a man and a woman to do the rough work."^ On 
August 19th Petion sent the required help. The man 
was Pierre Joseph Tison, formerly a clerk at the toll- 
houses, a native of Valenciennes, and fifty-seven years old ; 
the woman was his wife, one year younger. A little later 
their daughter Pierrette was admitted to the Temple to 
assist them.^ Tison was dressed in a sort of livery "of 
Savoyard shape and colour," and the couple were allowed 
a salary of 9,000 livres. They were attached more par- 
ticularly to the service of the Queen, Madame Elizabeth 
and Madame Royale. 

The kitchen-staff — the premises were situated in the left 
wing of the great courtyard of the Palace, very far from 
the Tower — was composed of a chef, Gagnie, a first and 
second assistant, Remy and Masson, a rotisseur, Meunier, 
who came from the Tuileries kitchen, a pastry-cook, Nivet, 
a scullion, Penaud, a pantry-boy, Guillot, a washer-up, 
Adrien, a kitchen help, Fontaine, a man to look after the 
plate, Mauduit, who was also in charge of the pantry, 
and three Tvaiters, Marchand, Chretien and Turgy, who, 
as we have related, had got into the Temple on their own 
initiative. 

The doorkeeper of the Tower, holding the position of 
steward, was Jean Francois Mathey, aged twenty-eight. 
His salary was 6,000 livres, and he had under his orders 
two turnkeys, Risbey and Rochez, both of a forbidding 
appearance, with bear's skin caps on their heads and big 
swords at their waists. "Although they were useless and 
often absent," each received 6,000 francs.^ 

A decree of the Commune ordered all the former ser- 
vants of Comte d'Artois to leave the Temple, but several 
succeeded in eluding this measure and even in getting 
employment with the guard or on the staff attending to 

' Madame Royale. 

* The Tisons also had a son, Pierre Joseph. Intermediaire des cher- 
cheurs et eurienx, No. 757. 
' Beaucourt, op. cit. 

32 



THE TEMPLE 

the prisoners' needs. Among these were the servant 
Gourlet, promoted to the position of turnkey, the man in 
charge of the plate, Angot, appointed as sawyer of wood, 
Mancel who retained his duties as sweeper, and Baron, an 
ex-floor-polisher who became the bailiff's man. The 
woman Rokenstrohe remained in charge of the linen-room ; 
Darque, the ex-beadle, in the porter's lodge at the Palace, 
and Picquet in that of the stables. There were in ad- 
dition two wood-carriers, an errand-man, Quenel, and a 
wig-maker, Danjout. Pere Lefebvre and Mere Mathieu 
continued to keep the bar in the large entrance court. All 
these people necessarily moved about within the precinct 
of the Temple; they went into the city, returned at their 
own free will, and if it so pleased them crossed the 
garden among the crowd of national guards composing 
the daily garrison. Several even entered the Tower in 
pursuance of their duties and approached the royal 
family. Now, the majority of them were, by tradition, 
interest or sentiment, disposed to be moved to pity by the 
prisoners' lot, although fear of losing their situations 
made them prudent. It is singular that the Commune, so 
scrupulously suspicious, took neither care nor time to re- 
cruit, in order to contribute to the strict surveillance they 
pretended to exercise, a staff whose opinion was more in 
conformity with its designs and less susceptible of attach- 
ment to the fallen regime. 



n 



THE COMMUNE 



The new intruding power which sat at the Hotel de 
Ville bore in fact, if not in its ardently revolutionary in- 
tentions, at least in its aptitudes the defect of its recruit- 
ment. After having attempted to sketch the installation 
of the family of Louis XVI at the Temple and before pene- 
trating into the narrative of the enigmatic peripetia of 
the captivity of the Dauphin, it is necessary to know the 
origin and composition of that Parisian Commune which, 
taking unfair advantage of the pusillanimity of the 
Legislative Body, arrogated to itself the custody of royal 
prisoners for whom it remains accountable in the eyes of 
History. It originated illegally in a popular movement 
in which the immense majority of Parisian electors took 
no part. 

On the night of August 9th, the General Assembly of 
the forty-eight sections of the capital, sitting at the Salle 
des Enfants Trouves, decided to appoint "three delegates 
per section in order to think of a prompt means of saving 
the common weal" by obtaining the King's deposition. A 
certain number of sections hastened to respond to this 
invitation and, a little after eleven o'clock at night, whilst 
the tocsin began to ring in the city, the first commission- 
ers chosen "by acclamation" arrived at the Hotel de Ville, 
where, in a large room on the first floor, the General 
Council constitutionally elected five months before and 
composed of one hundred and forty-four members^ was 
sitting. 

^By the terms of the Bill of May 21st, 1790, the General Council 
was composed of 16 administrators, 32 municipal officers and 96 
notables. 

34 



THE COMMUNE 

The new comers entered the Maison Commune mani- 
festly very perplexed regarding the way they were going 
to proceed "to save the common weal." Among the first 
arrivals were a carpenter, Boisseau, an ex-clerk of the 
city toll-houses, Huguenin, a working jeweller, Rossignol, 
sent by the Quinze-Vingt section; a haberdasher, Bon- 
homet, a wine merchant, David, and a lawyer, Lulier, rep- 
resenting the Mauconseil section ; a controller at the Mont- 
de Piete, Concedieu, belonging to the Arsenal delegation ; a 
hterary man, Robert, and the shoe-maker Simon, sent by 
the turbulent Theatre-Fran^ais section^ Little by little 
this small group was strengthened, and by three o'clock in 
the morning of August 10th twenty of the Paris sections 
were represented there. But this was not yet the majority 
and the commissioners, feeling that they were not in force, 
and shut up, without doing or deciding anything, in a 
room adjoining that in which the General Council con- 

^In addition to Robert and Simon, the Theatre-Frangais section had 
chosen Billaud-Varenne, which completed the number of the three 
commissioners required. All three were chosen on the night of 
August 9. See Braesch's list in La Commune insurrectioivneUe du 
10 aout, p, 245 and following pages. One cannot, therefore, explain 
how it is that Chaumette, who also belonged to the Theatre-Frangais 
section, could write that "On the 9th, at ten o'clock at night, the 
section chose him to form part of the new Council." Moreover, one 
ascertains that Chaumette does not seem to have appeared at the 
Hotel de Ville before the 10th, at noon. This is how he sets down the 
time-table of his movements during those two days: — ''''On the 9th, at 
10 o'clock at night, I was appointed to compose . . . the Revolutionary 
Council. At 11 o'clock they carried me home, worn out with fatigue. 
I had passed five nights without closing my eyes. On the 10th, in 
the Rue St. Honore, evil-disposed persons pointed me out as a priest. 
It was half past seven in the morning. At 8 o'clock I was at the 
Carrousel. . . I was dragged as far as the Rue St. Honore. . . At 
noon I hastened to the Maison Commune. . ." Papiers de Chaumette, 
published by F. Braesch, i^p. 136-137. Braesch, in his list of mem- 
bers of the Commune, mentions Chaumette as having been appointed, 
not on the night of the 9th, but only on the 10th, in the day time, 
and consequently with the supplementary commissioners intended to 
strengthen the new-born Council. It would be interesting to know, 
for the study of Chaumette's character, whether he appeared at the 
Hotel de Ville before or after the victory. The name of M. F. 
Braesch appears three times in this note, and it will be frequently 
found again in our references. It is impossible, indeed, to study the 
Paris Commune and consequently the history of the captivity at the 
Temple without borrowing much from M. Braesch's work, so rich 
in its documentation and so meritorious in its impartiality. 

35 



THE DAUPHIN 

tinued to sit, judged that it was urgent to send private 
messengers to their mandataries to demand the addition 
of three supplementary delegates per section, wliich would 
bring their total up to 288, — double that of the members 
of the legal Council. At the same time they hastily sum- 
moned the armed Parisian forces and soon 1,600 men,^ 
replying to the appeal, were massed on the Place de Greve 
and surrounded the Maison Commune. 

At dawn the commissioners numbered 82, representing 
27 sections. The moment had come for action. Entering 
the General Council chamber, they expelled it and took its 
place. At seven o'clock in the morning the substitution 
had taken place, and it was at this same hour that the 
armed populace rushed toward the Tuileries. The first 
cannon shot was fired at half past nine. As long as the 
battle lasted the delegates of the sections never left the 
Hotel de Ville; they sat there, under the presidency of 
Huguenin, as an Assembly of the representatives of the 
majority of the sections, making every effort to procure 
munitions for the assailants of the Chateau, giving 
orders to demolish it if necessary, summoning the 
patriots of the suburbs to their assistance. Ninety- 
six Swiss soldiers, defenders of the Tuileries, were led 
into the courtyard of the Hotel de Ville and immedi- 
ately massacred. At last, at noon it was announced 
that the King's residence was in the people's posses- 
sion. What joy! What a tumult! What shouts of 
triumph ! We have an echo of them in the following lines 
from Chaumette's Journal: "At noon I hastened to the 
Maison Commune. They received me there with embraces ; 
placed me at once on the standing committee. . . . The 
blood . . . the ninety-six Swiss . . . the thieves and a 
thousand others. ... I felt a desire to weep. One of my 
friends with bandaged head and torn face stretched out 

^Twenty-five men per section, save that of the Temple, which 
supplied 300, and that of Gravilliers, which sent 150. Braesch. 
Commune d/n 10 aoilt, 227, No. 3. 

36 



THE COMMUNE 

his arms to me. 'I live,' he said, 'and we have gained the 
victory !' I threw myself on his breast, my heart was full 
to overflowing, my eyes filled with tears. Oh! how re- 
lieved I was! . . ."^ Five abrupt lines, one might say 
breathless, — more eloquent than a report. 

The Assembly of the representatives of the sections, in- 
toxicated with success, congratulated by the frightened 
Legislative Body, acclaimed by all the hot-headed revolu- 
tionaries in Paris, set itself up as a government and with- 
out delay organised the Terror. Immediately it reahsed 
that it must profit by its victory, and it was then that, 
without intermission, in the course of a sitting which was 
not suspended for twenty-hours, it demanded the King's 
detention, chose the Temple as a jail, and assumed the 
custody of the captives, whilst stipulating that the public 
Treasury should meet the expenses. It rendered its de- 
crees and dictated its conditions with so savage an energy 
that, in less than two days, it was sovereign "outside and 
even above the National Assembly."^ 

However, nothing is more confused than its origin. No 
report of the election of its members was drawn up ; one 
can never even establish determined and authentic lists 
of them; even when it was formed and — not without hesi- 
tation — it had usurped the title of General Council, its 
composition remained uncertain. It was frequently modi- 
fied. "Passers-by," of whom "one hardly caught a 
glimpse," sat on its benches and were replaced without de- 
lay by other short-lived persons. We shall thus have the 
opportunity, in this narrative of the Dauphin's captivity, 
of seeing personages spring up who, presented and acting 
as members of the Commune, filled their office with au- 
thority, yet whose names do not appear on any official 
register, — figures of unknown men entangled in this drama 
without anything justifying their part and whose inex- 
plicable interference raises up insoluble hypotheses and 

^PayUrs de Chaumette published by Braesch. 
'Braesch. Commune du 10 aoiit, 350. 

37 



THE DAUPHIN 

singularly tenacious legends. The successive modifica- 
tions in the composition of the Commune changed nothing 
in its ways ; the disorder and demagogic carelessness of its 
inexperienced administrators, their contempt for the forms 
of justice and the suspicion of corruption which permitted 
the immorality of some of them, ever rebound in the shape 
of harrassing enigmas on the confused history of the 
Temple. It was in that way, however, that, from the early 
days, the Commune of August 10th gained a part of its 
astonishing prestige over the populace, amazed to be able 
to familiarise itself with this powerful governmental ma- 
chine and fully satisfied to see it actively crush everything 
which up to then had been reputed intangible and sacred. 

The revolutionary Commune held its meetings in the 

great council-chamber of the Hotel de Ville which the legal 

General Council — no more to be heard of — had sur-^ 

rendered without resistance on the night of August 10th. 

This "huge"^ room with seven windows looked on to the 

Place de Greve and occupied the whole of the first story 

of the central portion of the Hotel de Ville. At each end 

was a monumental chimney-piece, one surmounted by a 

portrait of Louis XIV, the other by a picture of Louis 

XV returning to the City of Paris the letters of nobility 

which had been withdrawn from it. On the walls, above 

the doors, were other pictures representing the aldermen 

of the city prostrate at the feet of the King.^ Busts of 

Louis XVI, Bailly, Necker, and La Fayette ornamented 

the room. At their very first sitting the representatives 

of the sections, acting as though they were in their own 

place, were filled with indignation at the sight of these 

provoking effigies. W^ithout waiting for the workmen who 

were to take them down, *'forty arms were immediately 

raised to cast down these false idols. They fell and were 

reduced to dust amidst acclamations from the Galleries."^ 

^Thierry's Guide de I' Amateur et de VEtranger, 1787, I, 559. 
Thierry, loc. cit., pp. 559-560. 
^Proc^s-verbaux de Chaumette. 

38 



THE COMMUNE 

Nor were the paintings of "the subordinate despots of the 
old regime" respected.-^ A bust of Brutus advantageously 
replaced these evidences of the days of slavery; a few 
weeks later there would be placed on the pedestal left 
vacant by the bust of Louis XVI a drum and a gun taken 
from the enemy by Westermann's soldiers ; they would 
suspend on the wall, as a trophy, the sash worn by col- 
league Le Meunier, the first municipal officer to die in the 
exercise of his duties^ and place there wreaths of oak and 
laurel with the inscription : "They await the conquerors."^ 

A high platform bore the arm-chairs and the desks of 
the president, secretaries and procurator of the Commune ; 
whilst opposite were two amphitheatres of seats, one re- 
served for the members of the Council, the other for the 
postulants and deputations from the sections whom a 
"Master of the Ceremonies'* was charged to introduce. 
At the two ends of the room were the public galleries.'* 
There was a refreshment room, kept by the door-keeper, 
where the members of the standing committee were supplied 
with refreshments free of charge; and a gallery had even 
been arranged in the room "for M. Marat," who was en- 
trusted with the work of recording the debates of the 
Commune. 

Such were the surroundings. At each of the sittings 
they were animated tumultuously. Almost continual from 
August 10th to September 8th, the settings were afterward 
held in the evening and continued late into the night. Long 

* The same. 

* "Carried away by a horse from the Louvre stables which he had 
had the imprudence to mount, this unfortunate man was passing near 
the Pont-au-Change when a sentinel cried out: 'Who goes there?' It 
was impossible for the municipal officer to stop his steed, whereupon 
the soldier fired and killed him." Souvenirs du baron Hue, pp. 
98-99. According to other versions, Le Meunier was pierced by a 
pike thrust during a domiciliary visit. 

' "One of the members of the Commune asked to what use the 
wreaths suspended in the room with the inscription 'they await the 
conquerors' were to be put. The president took one of them down 
and crowned a wounded man, named Waflard." C currier republicain, 
16 Pluvidse, year IL 

*M4moirea de I' Abbe Morellet, II, p. 64. 

39 



THE DAUPHIN 

before the hour the galleries were crowded with spectators, 
the surplus of whom filled the vestibules and passages. The 
members of the Council arrived in their office, or working 
clothes, artisans in their jackets and aprons.^ All wore 
the badge, the tricolour ribbon over the shoulders and the 
cockade over the heart. It was a rule that they should 
carry the cards delivered to them and sign an attendance 
sheet placed on the desk of one of the secretaries.^ Then 
they took their seats and when the president or his substi- 
tute had installed himself on the platform, the sitting was 
opened amidst uproar. 

We possess a few narratives by eye-witnesses who pene- 
trated — very reluctantly, however — into that council- 
chamber where, according to one observer, "two to three 
thousand people"^ were crowded together, — which appears 
to be an exaggeration. First of all, there was Hue, the 
valet of Louis XVI, who was taken there late at night on 
August 19th. Placed by the president's side, he com- 
manded a view of the whole place with the big gathering 
of municipal representatives and the galleries filled with 
men of the people, women and even children. "Some of 
those in this strange assembly were lying on the benches, 
sleeping." The night had been passed there and it was 
six in the morning. At last the King's valet was called 
upon to declare his name and Christian names. He turned 
toward the deputy of the procurator of the Commune — 
it was Billaud-Varenne who was questioning him; but the 
latter "admonished him in a senatorial tone": — "Citizen, 
reply to the sovereign people." So Hue addressed his 
justification to the company, "the greater part of whom 
were asleep and paid no more attention to the questions 
than to the answers." Those who were not slumbering 

' Lepltre's Quelques souvenirs on notes fiddles sur man service au 
Temple, p. 11. 
- Courrier frangais, No. 255, September 12, 1793, p. 95. 
» Morellet, II, p. 87. 

40 



THE COMMUNE 

interrogated him all at the same time, so that he was at 
a loss to know to whom to. listen,^ 

Pauline de Tourzel had appeared before Hue and like 
him had been invited to mount on the platform. The pic- 
ture she draws must be correct, for it agrees in ever}' point 
with the preceding description: "a huge crowd of people, 
■ — galleries filled with men and women, — Billaud-Varenne 
on his feet, questioning, — a secretary writing down the 
replies in a large register." — "I was in no way frightened ; 
I asked in a very loud voice to be allowed to rejoin my 
mother and to leave her side no more. Several voices 
were raised to say : 'Yes ! Yes !' Others murmured."" 

A year later, in September 1793, the communal protocol 
was no more formal ; on that point we are inf oraied by the 
witty academician Morellet, who was desirous of obtain- 
ing a card of citizenship without which he could not receive 
his modest pension. He had deposited in the offices of 
the Commune the favourable certificate delivered by his 
section; the General Council was to decide in last resort. 
Morellet, then 67 years old, undertook many times, in the 
course of the summer, the journey to the Maison Com- 
mune. It was a long way from the Faubourg du Roule, 
where he lived, to the Hotel de Ville. His insistence re- 
mained without effect ; for "they could not find his papers ; 
the offices had changed their premises ; his turn had not 
eome." They adjourned the matter for a week, then for 
a fortnight. Finally, on the morning of September 17th 
he received a summons to appear at the night sitting to 
undergo the examination preliminary to the delivery of 
the precious card. 

He entered the room at six o'clock. The two amphi- 
theatres were already filled with women of the people "of 
soldierly bearing," knitting, mending jackets and breeches, 
"paid to attend the spectacle and applaud at the right 

^Souvenirs du baron Hue, p. 81 and following pages. 
-Souvenirs de quarante ans. Mme. de Tourzel's narrative adds 
nothing to that of Pauline. 

41 



THE DAUPHIN 

moments."^ After waiting an hour the Council was 
formed; the president and secretary ascended the steps 
of their platform and installed themselves ; and the report 
of the previous day's sitting was read. This was followed 
by a diatribe from Hebert, le Fere Duchesne, protesting, 
in the name of republican austerity, against the young and 
pretty solicitresses who besieged the offices. Then came 
the entry of a delegation from a section desirous of pre- 
senting its contingent of conscripts. A second delegation 
followed ; then a third, a fourth and a fifth ; and each of 
these bodies of soldiers entered the room to a great beating 
of drums. One of them was preceded by a military band. 
They speechified and resolved "to clear the soil of liberty 
of the satellites of all despots,'* to which President Lubin, a 
painter and son of a butcher of the Rue du Faubourg 
Saint-Honore, replied by singing the Marseillaise which 
the whole company repeated in chorus. After the Marseil- 
laise it was the ^a ira, accompanied by clapping of hands 
and stamping of feet. When these two hymns had been 
heard five times, a wounded soldier appeared to make a 
present of his valour to the Paris Commune. He spoke 
as follows : "Citizens, I 'as been in the army and I 'as got 
this *ere wound! . . ." After the wounded man, three 
Austrian deserters stepped forward to offer their services 
to the French Republic and were cheered. Lubin admin- 
istered their oath and honoured them with his fraternal 
embrace. At last the petitioners' turn came. On their 
names being called out, they stood on the platform before 
the president's table, facing the public. Then Lubin 
demanded: "Is there anyone here who knows Citizen 

N and answers for his patriotism.'"' If no one 

replied, the word "Adjourned!" was uttered. But when 
one of the municipal representatives said: "I know the 

^Lepltre, who was a member of the Commune, writes similarly: 
". . . That crowd of lazy women who came to earn their daily retri- 
bution by applauding after a given signal." Quelques souvenirs. 

42 



THE COMMUNE 

citizen and answer for him," the president pronounced the 
word "Granted !" Such was the prescribed form. 

Morellet, that director of the French Academy led 
into this demagogic den, heard, as one may well imagine, 
the decision "Adjourned!" Three commissioners were in- 
structed to make an enquiry into his patriotism. He re- 
tained their names carefully; they were Viallard, Bernard 
and Paris. Descending from the platform he approached 
Viallard ^ humbly and begged him to name the hour at 
which it would be possible to confer with him. The 
municipal representative fixed as the date the following 
day, as the place for the conversation the same council- 
chamber, where he promised he would be, with his two 
colleagues, at noon precisely. Morellet was there to the 
minute. He arrived wet through with perspiration and 
the rain, accompanied by a servant carrying a bag con- 
taining eight to ten volumes of his works. The room 
was empty. He sat down, reflecting upon his speech, and 
he had plenty of time before him to do so, for he waited 
for more than two hours. 

At last a man appeared. It was Viallard. The academi- 
cian immediately opened his bag and naively began his 
demonstration. The whole of his work bore testimony to 
his patriotic opinions, his tolerance, his veneration for 
liberty. The municipal representative listened to him with 
a vacant air, turned over a few pages with the end of 
his finger, half-opened a second volume, cast it one side, 
and turned to a third. "Yes, yes, that is good," he said. 
However, as this examination visibly fatigued him, he cut 
it short. "But what you show me here does not bear on 
the matter. . . . You must prove your patriotism during 
the days of August 10th and May 31st. . . . All the 
academicians are enemies of the Republic." Morellet ex- 
cused himself on the score of his age, which forced him 
to inaction; he strove to excite his judge to pity, pleading 

^Jacques Viallard, wig-maker, 3 Porte Saint-Honord. Almanack 
national, 1794. 

43 



THE DAUPHIN 

that, his income being reduced from 30,000 livres to 300 
ecus, he had lost a httle of his combative ardour. "Ah! 
yes, you have lost," sighed Viallard. "Everybody is in 
the same box. . . . Myself. ... I was a ladies' hair- 
dresser. I have always loved mechanics and have pre- 
sented before the Academy of Sciences tops of my own 
invention. . . ." Morellet was already putting back the 
books into his bag. He took leave of Viallard, who held 
out no hope but advised him to see his colleague Bernard 
and arrange with him. 

The next day the immortel set off again, turning his 
steps toward the Faubourg Saint-Antoine, where Bernard 
lived. Morellet found a man "with an ignoble face, like 
that of an incendiary, and with him a little woman fairly 
young but very ugly and filthy." Whilst the latter was 
making her luncheon of a piece of cheese with a "big scoun- 
drel" who appeared to be the friend of the house, Morellet 
conversed with the commissioner, Bernard compassion- 
ated the painful position of the ex-academician. "But I 
also have lost through the Revolution, for such as you see 
me I'm a priest, and a married priest, — and this is my 
wife. . . . Well, I've only a thousand francs like your- 
self and five hundred francs which they give me for being 
guardian of the church here. And we live very well, my 
wife and I ; and we have also the wherewithal to invite our 
friends to luncheon. You must see Paris," he concluded; 
and he promised to go that evening to the Commune to 
concert with his colleagues. 

Morellet presented his compliments to the priest and 
priestess, as well as to the big rascal, who had joined in 
the conversation. At six in the evening he was at the 
Hotel de Ville. Tired out by his continual running about, 
he settled himself, to be on the watch for the arrival of 
his commissioners, in the secretarial room, through which 
the municipal representatives passed on the way to their 
seats. There he heard the shouts and transports of joy 
of the Assembly, the (^a ira and the patriotic hymn, the 

44 



THE COMIMUNE 

joyous clamour of the women in the galleries. Of the 
three personages for whom he was waiting, he perceived, 
however, only the hair-dresser Viallard, still warm from an 
oration which he had just delivered on the subject of the 
taxation of foodstuffs. At eleven at night, tired of wait- 
ing, the petitioner returned to Roule. The next day, at 
dawn, he was off again, searching for Paris, chosen as the 
third judge. Paris lived in the Rue de Carmes, near the 
Place Maubert. He, at least, was a lettered man ; he was 
acquainted with Morellet's works and spoke to him very 
honestly about them; but no more than the others would 
he consent to pledge himself. He appeared to Morellet 
to be frightened. 

In the evening the unfortunate solicitor was back at 
the Hotel de Ville once more, stationed in the secretarial 
room with two hundred others who like him were in expecta- 
tion of chance protectors. Songs, addresses from the sec- 
tions and cheering never ceased in the large neighbouring 
room from seven until nine o'clock. The Marseillaise 
was followed by couplets from comic operas, for instance, 
on the air, du Moineau qui t'a fait envie, which Lubin 
sang with roulades and variations that delighted his audi- 
tors. "It is funny that they should spend the time of 
their assembly in singing," said a woman of the people 
sitting next to Morellet, and who was waiting in vain un- 
resignedly. "Are they there for that purpose?" When 
he decided to enter the council-chamber a young citizen 
with black shining hair falling over his eyes was singing 
a patriotic hymn in twelve couplets in which, in halting 
verse, he advocated "the massacre of priests surfeited 
with crimes and the necessity of burying them under their 
bloody-stained altars.'* The women stamped their feet, 
hats were waved in the air, and the spectators approved 
without restriction: "He's got that off well! That's 
good ! Excellent !" And everybody was so well pleased 
that it was decided the song should be printed at the ex- 

45 



THE DAUPHIN 

pense of the Commune and distributed in the Depart- 
ments.^ 

This lyrical interiude marked the end of Morellet*s re- 
lations with the General Council. Tired of making so 
many vain applications, of waiting impatiently at such 
musical performances as the above, he gave up trying 
to obtain the certificate of citizenship and returned to his 
suburb, thoroughly decided to leave it as little as possible. 
Thanks to his discomfiture we possess the invaluable pic- 
ture given here in little and which reveals the too rarely 
described appearance of the sittings of the Council, at 
the same time as the physiognomy of certain of its mem- 
bers. The three figures of Viallard, Paris and Bernard 
form precisely a perfect synthesis of the whole of the 
municipal representatives. Although the composition of 
the Commune was modified several times during the Revo- 
lution,^ its intellectual and moral level hardly changed; 
it was always full of artisans, shop-keepers, or small em- 
ployers embittered by ill-fortune ; of literary men without 
genius, doctors without patients, starving professors, err- 
ing priests, and TiomTues de loi, — a vague title which im- 
posed on ordinary folk and under which there often lay 
hidden more cunning greediness than respect for law. 
The vulgarity of the greater number, the infatuation of a 
few, the cynicism of the more brazen — or more cowardly, 
the aversion of these mediocre people for superiority of 
birth, intelligence or education, — such are the important 
elements of the drama which was played daily at the 
Temple and of which these municipal representatives were 
the impresarios and chief actors. To hold in their pos- 
session and molest at leisure the King descended from so 

^M4moires de I'AbM Morellet, 1821, Vol. II, pp. 62 to 99. 

'Between August, 1792, and July, 1794, there were three Communes: 
the insurrectional Commune, the provisional Commune of December 
2nd, 1792, and the definite Commune of August 19th, 1793, which 
was itself "purified" and "regenerated." Many of the members of 
the first were in succeeding assemblies. They seem to have given 
them the tone, which remained uniform, despite the rejuvenation of 
the staff, until the 9th of Thermidor. 

46 



THE COMMUNE 

many kings and the beautiful Queen of the Trianon, what 
a voluptuous and depraved godsend to men naturally 
hateful of all beauty and nobility. 

This judgment, which appears, perhaps, too general 
and too severe, finds justification, if there be need of it, 
in the choice of the leaders whose guidance the Commune 
accepted almost lovingly. It had two idols: Chaumette 
and Hebert, and though the rash mania for rehabilitation 
has been terribly rife during the past half-century, these 
are two names which nobody has yet attempted or will 
ever seriously attempt to impose on the admiration of 
posterity. The son of a Nevers shoe-maker, an unruly 
scholar expelled from college, a cabin-boy at thirteen, 
later a surgeon's apprentice, a student of physics, an 
usher, secretary to an English doctor, and finally an in- 
definite sort of gazetteer in Paris, Chaumette, at twenty- 
seven years of age, in 1790, was the perfect model of 
those adventurers — "wreckage from the struggle for life" 
— who, having never made a profound study of anything, 
talk audaciously on every subject and succeed in imposing 
themselves by their knowledge on the ignorant and by 
their assurance on men of instruction. The Revolution 
was a haven of salvation for many of these human wrecks. 
Chaumette, an ardent orator of the clubs, owed a rapid 
reputation to his eloquence, at once bombastic and "good- 
natured," with which the naive patriots of his section 
were wonder-struck. Chosen by them, as we have seen, to 
be among the commissioners entrusted with the "saving 
of the commonwealth," he exerted himself so well, spoke 
so abundantly and with so sincere — or so well feigned — a 
conviction that, on December 12th, he was elected Public 
Prosecutor-in-Chief of the Commune. "Applause from 
the people, delirious joy on their part. I was over- 
whelmed with benedictions and applause," he wrote in the 
pocket-book in which he noted his impressions. And he 
added : "Louis Capet, Louis Capet, I defy you when you 

4^7 



THE DAUPHIN 

were King to have experienced so much gratification as 
I did."i 

He was a little man^ with a broad heavy face, some- 
what "astonished'* blue ejes, big nose, heavy chin and 
sensual lips. He wore his flaxen hair long, a portrait de- 
picts him with uncombed locks and a large crumpled 
collar tightened by a negligently tied cravat. As to his 
morals. . . .? That is a mysterj'^, — or "chaos," as Henri 
Martin puts it. He was at one and the same time naive 
and cunning, enthusiastic and base, hiding a solid sub- 
structure of cowardice under bursts of audacity, envious 
and jealous, yet compassionate and easily touched, modest 
and depraved.^ To these contradictions he owed an un- 
deniable talent as a dissembler, a very sure instinct of the 
tone it was necessary for him to assume according to 
the rank or disposition of his auditors. A sly and con- 
summate humbug, he acted at one time with sympathetic 
straightforwardness, at another in a spirit of indignation ; 
he was one after the other poetical, familiar, coarse, iron- 
ical, enraged, honej^ed, mystic in the manner of Rousseau, 
or joking in imitation of Figaro, but with infinitely less wit, 
"Formerly I was called Pierre Gaspard Chauraette be- 
cause my godfather believed in the saints," he said by way 
of an oration at the time of his installation as Public 
Prosecutor of the Commune; "but since the Revolution 
I have taken the name of a saint who was hanged for his 
republican principles. That is why I call myself to-day 
Anaxagoras Chaumette."* Such was his manner and 
people were delighted. As he often drank a drop too 
much and was, if not drunk, at least "inflamed" by wine, 
his voice was always veiled with a chronic hoarseness 

which forced attention and commanded silence ; unless that 

^PapiSrs de Chaumette, p. 144. 

"His height when 21 years old was 5 feet, or 1 m. 62. 

'A few years ago there was discovered among the papers seized 
in the year II at his house a correspondence so revelatory of his 
vicious habits that it is not possible to make allusion to it. Regarding 
the moral character of the procurator of the Commime, see M. F. 
Braesch's introduction to the Papiers de Chaumelte, 1908. 

^1. Moniteur, December, 1792. 

48 



THE COMMUNE 

was an additional piece of cleverness, a trick on the part 
of a vain and free-and-easy orator, anxious to distinguish 
himself from his brawling colleagues. Such was the man 
who for more than a year was to be the absolute master 
of the Temple and who would govern the captivity of the 
royal family according to the changing exigencies of his 
popularity and interest. 

Hebert, his deputy, before figuring in that quality in 
the Almanuch national, has been inscribed in 1786 in the 
Almanach des spectacles as "box-keeper" at the Theatre 
des Varietes. Driven out of his native town, Alen9on, 
a sorry and ill-dressed individual, he also had idled about 
Paris, searching for dinners on an empty stomach. Year 
after year, without a crown in his pocket and living on 
chance meetings, he accumulated against the rich and the 
fortunate so much bitterness and rancour that he had 
them "to sell again." And when the Revolution came he 
sold them. His scurrilous Pere Duchesne, his marriage 
with a secularized nun and above all his dealings at the 
Ministry of War made him well off. He was violent, 
cold, master of himself, circumspect and insinuating; 
cramming his journal with oaths and obscenities, depict- 
ing himself on the frontispiece of his paper as a muscular 
boor with axe in hand, pipe in mouth, cocked hat on head 
and pistols in his belt, he was, in reality,* correct in de- 
portment and puny in appearance. His straight nose, 
thin lips, distrustful eyes, his chin lost in a high cravat, 
his impenetrable and suspicious countenance gave him the 
air of a man on guard, scenting an enemy in every asso- 
ciate and in mortal fear of clear-sightedness. A business 
speculator, convinced that he was of a stature to combine 
big intrigues, ambitious of making money, hesitating be- 
fore no ignominy to attain his goal, honeyed when he 
chose to be so and easily irritated, he personified calm du- 
plicity and penetrating dissimulation. A terrible man. 
He also was to prowl about the Temple just as he liked, 

^According to a sketch by Gabriel in the Carnavalet Museum. 

49 



THE DAUPHIN 

but he did it prudently, not, like others, for the vain 
curiosity of approaching the prisoners and enjoying their 
humiliation ; but only when one of his sinister combina- 
tions commanded it or when he anticipated a personal 
advantage from the visit. 

It would be unjust to conclude from the portraits of 
these two noteworthy personages that all the members 
of the Commune — their adulators — were uniformly mon- 
sters. The sheepish allurement of some, the incapacity 
of others, the pleasure of playing a part, of being an 
important person, of holding an eminent position and 
profiting by it should an opportunity offer,- — such were 
the motives of the ardour which the majority of them 
showed in carrying out their duties. But, side by side 
with these impenitent fanatics, there were many honest 
men who hid their good nature under austere manners. 
Even among those whose roughness was inborn and in- 
corrigible were a number of artisans and Parisian shop- 
keepers who were neither better nor worse than those whom 
one might recruit nowadays in the same social classes. 
Greatly flattered by the honour of being the elect of the 
people, they also felt a sort of dread and embarrassment. 
At the Hotel de Ville, amidst the hubbub of the sittings, 
the noise of drums and patriotic songs, under the fast 
downpour of Chaumette's orations, perhaps they took 
themselves seriously, and believed they had become the 
worthy successors of Brutus, Codes Horatius and Cas- 
sius with whose names — with which they were barely ac- 
quainted — the others pestered them. But once left to 
themselves and face to face with their own conscience 
they discovered they were timorous and perplexed ; when 
they were no longer under the eye of masters and com- 
rades they felt themselves much less brave ; the feelings, 
beliefs, even prejudices accumulated by atavism since child- 
hood in their adult hearts were not suddenly obliterated 
by the fact that they wore the municipal scarf and bore 
the title of commissioner. And here we have an explana- 

50 



THE COMMUNE 

tion of the embarrassment many of them showed when 
in the presence of the royal family. 

As early as its first sitting the insurrectional Com- 
mune had decided that every evening "the names of the 
commissioners charged with the custody of the King 
should be drawn by lot from an urn containing the names 
of all the members of the Council." ^ That was done, with- 
out the slightest doubt, at the beginning; but, either be- 
cause this system did not give satisfaction to impatient 
ones, or because they regarded chance itself with sus- 
picion, it appeared later prudent to follow, in choosing 
the commissioners, the alphabetic order of the list of 
members.^ Ordinarily the sittings of the Commune began 
between six and seven in the evening. By granting an 
hour or two to preliminaries devoted, as Morellet relates, 
to delegations and patriotic songs, the choice of the com- 
missioners for the Temple was not made before eight 
o^clock. Supposing that they had set off immediately, 
that they had called at home for their slippers or night- 
caps, or with the object of telling their housekeepers where 
they were going,^ they would not have reached the prison 
before nine or ten at night, and this is indeed the time we 
find set down in all the narratives of municipal represen- 
tatives who have reported their sentry-duty.* They had 

^Report of the sitting of August 13th, 1793. 

^As the authentication is of importance, we must explain here on 
what it is based. The National Archives preserve the daily powers 
of the Commissioners of the Temple from October 1st, 1793, until 
the 4tb of Thermidor, year II. Now, on making a list of the names 
inscribed thereon, one notices that, with the exception of casual 
substitutions, the initials of these names are in alphabetic order: — 
October 17th, Commissioners: Avril, Arnauld, Berthelin, Deltroit. 
October 18th, Commissioners: Beaurieux, Beauvallet, Bernard, Bergot. 
October 19th, Commissioners: Barel, Binet, Cresson, Camus. Octo- 
ber 20th, Commissioners: Charlemagne, Chretien, Cordas, Cochefer. 
October 22nd, Commissioners: Cellier, Daubancourt, Daujon, De- 
caudin. 

*"I had taken the precaution to carry my night-cap with me." 
Goret's narrative: Mon temoignage. 

* "We arrived at nine o'clock at night. . ." Lepitre. Quelques sou- 
venirs. — "I reached the Temple a little after ten o'clock at night." 

51 



THE DAUPHIN 

dinner with the eight colleagues they found installed 
there and, after the meal partaken in common, as they 
were to remain at the Temple two full days and were "re- 
lieved half at a time," the four municipal representatives 
who had arrived two days before returned home, the four 
others who had been on guard only twenty-four hours 
remaining with the new-comers. The uniting of the eight 
commissioners formed the Council of the Temple, and it 
was always the later arrivals who, about midnight, 
mounted guard over the prisoners.^ 

On October 25th the family of Louis XVI left M. Ber- 
thelemy^s apartment and took possession of the big 
Tower.^ The single large room on each of the stories 
had been hastily divided, on the second and third floors, 
into four rooms of almost equal dimensions, measuring 
about four metres fifty centimetres by four metres. On 
the second story ceilings of stretched canvas were im- 
provised, in order to hide the height of the Gothic arches,^ 
and as the Tower was without chimneys they had had to 
block up certain windows with warming apparatus the 

Moelle. Six journdes passees au Temple. — "There was a decree of 
January 14th (1793), confirmed on April 14th, which ordered the 
door to be closed at eleven o'clock and prohibited it being opened 
to any person whatsoever after that hour." Papidrs du Temple (LV). 

^This was so at the time of the trial of Louis XVI, when the 
Council of the Temple was composed of eight commissioners, namely, 
four appointments a day. After January 21st the number was re- 
duced to four. Afterward it was changed to six, then returned to 
eight again for a certain time. The composition of the Council, as 
far as it concerns the time of the incidents set down in this narrative, 
was regularly four commissioners, first of all relieved two by two. 
From October, 1793, to the 9th of Thermidor, the commissioners 
remained no longer than twenty-four hours at the Temple. Four 
were chosen daily to go in the evening and relieve the four colleagues 
appointed the day before. — "Duty at the Temple was so disagreeable 
and the responsibility so dreadful that some of the members fled 
from the Council when they saw the urn for the drawing of lots 
brought in, and this gave rise to a decree ordering the commander 
of the guards of the Commime to conduct to the Temple by force 
all those members who, having been selected, were not there later 
than ten o'clock at night. Several were thus taken there." Daujon's 
narrative, the manuscript of which was in Victorien Tardou's col- 
lection of autographs. 

''The King was installed there alone as early as September 29th. 

"Clery. 

52 



THE COMMUNE 

smoke from which was got rid of outside by means of long 
sheet-iron pipes secured to the walls and rising to the 
roof of the donjon.^ 




THIRD STORY OF THE BIG TOWER OF THE TEMPLE 

(Apartment of the Queen) 

A. Wooden door. B. Iron door. C. Anteroom; wardrobes. D. The 
Queen's room. E. Toilette room. F. Chamber of Mme. Elizabeth. G. Cham- 
ber of the Tison household. J. Water-closets. K. Little stove. L. Stairway 
leading to the top of the turret. M. Woodhouse. 

The second floor was reserved for the King. There 
were two doors : one of wood, with an iron knocker,^ the 
other of iron, and each was furnished with a strong lock 

^Account of stove-work done at the Temple by Marguerite & 
Firino, 13, Rue de Paradis. National Archives, F*, 1306. 

^ Account from Durand, lock-smith. National Archives, The same 
file. 

53 



THE DAUPHIN 

and four bolts. In each, too, was pierced a sliding judas.^ 
The anteroom on which they opened was covered with a 
wall-paper representing freestone. Immediately on the 
right of the entrance door was a space two metres in 
depth forming the embrasure of the window supplied with 
strong bars and an exterior shade. In this embrasure, 
placed against the wall on the left, was a large semi-cir- 
cular china stove, the pipe of which passed under the case- 
ment.^ Near the stove and fixed on the wall was an Ar- 
gand lamp. Facing the window was a glazed partition 
with two doors, likewise glazed with clear glass.^ One of 
these doors was that of the dining-room, a narrow and 
somewhat dark little room;^ the other led to the room 
where Clery slept. The anteroom was furnished with eight 
chairs upholstered in pink velvet, a desk and a card-table.^ 
On the left of the door, posted up on the wall, was a large 
picture of the Declaration of the Rights of Man and 
Citizen, framed with a border in three colours. 

The door of the bedroom faced this picture, — a double 
door with two broad panels opened the whole day and 
closed only at night. The fireplace, ornamented with 
a mirror,® a clock by Lepaute and two silver candlesticks, 
was in a line with the door. Bright yellow wall-paper 
covered the walls.^ The bed was placed on the left, on 
entering the room, — a four-post bed with curtains and 
covers of green damask, a spring mattress, three mat- 
tresses covered with fustian, a bolster and its white taf- 

^ Idem. 

'This stove still exists and is to be seen in the donjon of Vincennes. 
'Account for painting work done at the Temple by Watin. Na- 
tional Archives, ¥*, 1306. 

* The dining-room measured 4 m. 20 by 3 m. 50, 

"Temple Commission. Receipt for furniture. October 25tb, 1792. 
Beaucourt, II, 29, 

* Measuring 48 inches by 38 = 1 m. 30 by 1 m. 12. 

^ "The door-keeper assures me that this colour was specially chosen 
in order to insult, by a coarse and stupid allusion, the man for 
whom the room was intended." Letter on the Temple Prison and the 
two children of Louis XVI to serve as a supplement to the Memoirs 
of CUry. 

54 



THE COMMUNE 

feta slip.^ A hergere, an arm-chair, four chairs, a 
screen, — all upholstered in damask of the same material 
as the bed curtains, a folding bed for the Dauphin, a 
chest-of-drawers with a marble top, a desk-table with a 
green morocco top and a few other objects for personal 
use^ completed the furniture. A circular room about 
three metres in diameter, in the turret adjoining the bed- 
room, had been arranged as the King's study and con- 
tained a small "pedestal" stove with its china stand,^ two 
straw-bottomed chairs, and a table. 

A passage one metre broad led from the bedroom of 
Louis XVI to the water-closets a Vanglaise installed in the 
southern turret. The room reserved for Clery communi- 
cated with this corridor by a door which the commis- 
sioners closed every night and the key of which they took 
away, so that if the King wanted his valet's assistance 
during the night Clery had to pass through the anteroom 
to enter his master's bedroom.^ The dining-room, fur- 
nished with a folding table with oak legs, five cane chairs 
painted gray, a dumb-waiter a la Turque, and two comer 
cupboards, was warmed only by the stove in the ante- 
room.^ The glazed door which separated it from this 
room was without curtains and the eastern turret which 
prolonged it served as a woodhouse. 

The arrangement of the rooms on the third floor, re- 
served for Marie Antoinette, her daughter and Madame 

^ The bed, like the other pieces of furniture mentioned in the 
aforementioned account, came from the Palace of the Temple; it 
had been used by the Captain of the Guards of Comte d'Artois. 
Clery's Journal. 

^A mahogany pot cupboard, a mahogany bid)et with its china re- 
ceptacle, etc. 

^Account for stove articles. National Archives, F*, 1306. 

* The furniture in Clery's bedroom consisted of a four-post bed with 
striped green, red and yellow cover, a chintz-covered arm-chair, four 
chairs upholstered in blue and white velvet, a chest of drawers with 
a marble top, a double-doored oak wardrolje, etc. Temple Commis- 
sion. Receipt for furniture. See also Revue retrospective, 1837, 2nd 
series, Vol. IX, p. 251. 

^ "On the second floor, only the King's bedroom had a staircase." 
Lepitre. 

55 



THE DAUPHIN 

Elizabeth/ was almost the same. The Tison household 
inhabited the little room situated above the dining-room 
of the second story; the Queen and Madame Royale oc- 
cupied the bedroom above that where Louis XVI and his 
son slept ; only, on "the women'^s story" there was no 
corridor, and in order to reach the water-closets in the 
southern turret it was necessary to cross Madame Eliza- 
beth's bedroom, the only doors of which opened on to these 
water-closets and the anteroom.^ From these water- 
closets there ascended a small spiral staircase leading to 
the top of the turret whence, through narrow loopholes, 
one could look down on to the way of the rounds situated 
between the battlements and the slope of the pointed roof 
of the Tower. 

This singularly dry and apparently exaggeratedly 
minute description is indispensable to whoever would fol- 
low intelligently the narratives left us by the actors in 
the Temple tragedy and would compare them with the 
documents preserved in our various archives. To- 
pography is a sure criterion by which is to be discerned 
the more or less exactitude of an account or a report, 
and everything which does not agree with it may be con- 
sidered to be imaginary or erroneous. It dissipates cer- 
tain obscurities with which inevitable legend has sur- 
rounded the obligatorily common life led in the royal 
prison by the prisoners and their jailors. 

We have seen the commissioners of the Commune, ap- 
pointed about eight o'clock at night, dining with their 
colleagues in the Council Chamber on the ground-floor of 
the Tower. It was the custom that the last comers should 
take night sentry-duty in the King's anteroom and in that 
of the Queen. They drew lots as to who should occupy 
one or the other of these posts, to which they went about 

^ See the plans of the second and third stories of the big Tower, 
pp. 18 and 53. 

" Madame Elizabeth's bedroom, like Clery's on the lower floor, 
"was intensely dark." Letter on the Temple Prison . . . and CUry. 

56 



THE COMMUNE 

midnight,^ after the "new ones" had become acquainted 
with the regulations, which consisted "in never losing 
sight of the prisoners for a single instant, in speaking to 
them only when answering their questions, in never telling 
them anything of what was happening, in giving them only 
the title of Monsieur or Madannef, but in saying nothing 
which might offend or disturb them, and in always keeping 
their hats on."^ 

On reaching the anteroom, they found there, on the 
second as well as on the third floor, a folding bed placed 
across the closed doorway of the bedroom. On this small 
mean couch, supplied with summary bedding,^ the com- 
missioner of the Commune, in all his clothes, stretched 
himself. He who was in the King's anteroom, heard, 
throughout the night, in spite of the two doors separating 
him from the sleeper, a sonorous and regular snore which 
fully reassured him as to the prisoner's presence ;* but it 
was not before day-break that he was able to perceive him. 
Clery left his room between six and seven in the morning; 
the commissioner's bed was folded up and placed in the 
wood-house;^ and the valet, accompanied by the munici- 
pal representative, entered the King's bedroom. Louis 
XVI drew aside the curtains of his bed and his first look 
was at the commissioner on duty. He had a good mem- 
ory for names and faces, recognizing at long intervals 
those he had already seen. If it were a stranger, he ob- 
served him attentively, without saying a word. Clery lit 
the fire in the fire-place and the small stove in the neigh- 
boring study, then returned to the King who, sitting on 
the edge of his bed, was slipping on a dressing-gown. 
Clery at once put on his shoes. Louis XVI shaved himself, 

* See the report of Dorat-Cubieres, secretary to the Commune. 
Histoire parlementaire de la Revolution by Buchez and Roux, Vol. 
XXII, p. 333. 

' Verdier's narration. Beaucourt, Vol. I, p. 339. 
*Lepitre complains of it. Quelques souvenirs, etc. 

* Goret's Man timoignage. Verdier's Tableau historique. 
^ Clery. 

57 



THE DAUPHIN 

but the valet assisted him in his toilet, did his hair, and 
dressed him. 

The dress which the King wore in the Temple was al- 
ways the same: a pale maroon-coloured coat, lined with 
fine brown holland, with gilded metal buttons.^ The mu- 
nicipal representative Moelle, who sets down these details, 
reports that, on December 5th, 179S, the first day he was 
on guard, all this little commotion on rising did not 
awaken the Dauphin, sleeping soundly on a folding bed 
placed at the foot of his father's. When the King's toilet 
was completed, Clery awakened the young prince whose 
diverting "prattle" and playful tricks filled the sad room 
with joy. Whilst Clery occupied himself with the child, 
the King read by the fire-side; then, when his son had 
said his prayers, he withdrew to his study to spend a quar- 
ter of an hour reading his breviary or, on days of obliga- 
tion, the Prayers of the Holy Spirit. 

On the third floor, the levee of the Queen and prin- 
cesses took place just as simply. The room, moreover, 
lent itself but little to ceremonial. When, about seven 
o'clock, the municipal representative on duty in the en- 
trance room had, with Tison's assistance, folded up his 
bed, he waited until Marie Antoinette left her bedroom. 
She opened her door about eight o'clock and passed into 
Madame Elizabeth's room ; but on crossing the anteroom 
she cast a "scrutinising" look at the guardian of the day, 
seeking to discover what the feelings and education of 
the new commissioner might be. A moment later young 
Madame Royale appeared on the threshold of the bed- 
room and also inspected the new-comer. Finally Madame 
Elizabeth, equally curious to know the man under whose 
guardianship she was to live until evening, approached in 
her turn, put a few commonplace questions to the delegate 
of the Commune, asking, for instance, if it was his first 
visit to the Temple, in what section he lived, what his 
'Moelle. Six journ^ea passSes au Temple. 



THE COMMUNE 

trade was, and if he had any children. . . .^ The three 
princesses wore a morning deshabille, a pierrot or dressing- 
gown of white dimity, with a little linen cap or kerchief 
tied en charlotte over the hair. A little before nine 
o'clock they reappeared dressed in a very simple day gown 
of white muslin or dark flowered material. The woman 
Tison, obsequious and cunning, assisted them in their 
toilet, whilst Tison — very gloomy and acrimonious — was 
laying the breakfast table in the anteroom.^ It was the 
hour at which the wood-carriers Hese and Petit-Ruffin re- 
plenished the wood-house, when the water-carrier refilled 
the jugs and filters, when the lamp-man trimmed the Ar- 
gand lamps^ and street-lamps, — a great commotion on the 
part of the whole staff, whose movement, accompanied by 
the noise of heavy locks and the metallic clanging of mas- 
sive doors filled the sonorous spiral staircase with uproar. 
At nine o'clock the King and the Dauphin, accompanied 
by their municipal jailor mounted to the third floor to 
breakfast with the princesses. The three waiters, Turgy, 
Marchand and Chretien, accompanied by the commis- 
sioners who had spent the night on the ground floor of 
the Tower, carried the meal from the distant kitchens and 
placed on the table coffee, chocolate, a bowlful of warm 
thick cream, another of hot milk, a decanter of cold syrup, 
another of cold milk, a third of barley water and a fourth 
of lemonade, three pats of butter, a plate of fruit, six 
rolls, three loaves, a sugar basin of powdered sugar, an- 
other of lump, and a salt-cellar.^ According to unani- 
mous testimony, the prisoners were "very sober." The 
King, without sitting down, broke a piece of bread and 
drank a glass of lemonade.^ Clery served, whilst Turgy 

^ Lepltre and Moelle. 

^C16ry and Moelle. 

^ One hundred and seventy-six lamps burnt the whole night at the 
Temple, Later the number was reduced to 13S. The cost was 10 
sols (5d) per night per lamp. National Archives, F*, 4392. Ac- 
count from Briet, contractor for the illumination of the Temple. 

* Verdier's report to the General Council of the Commune. Buchez 
and Roux, Vol. XXII, p. 355. 

= Cl^ry and Moelle. 

59 



THE DAUPHIN 

and his colleagues stood near the entrance, waiting until 
the meal was over to carry back to the kitchens the abun- 
dant remains, intended for the servants. All the commis- 
sioners, also standing, but with their hats on, were on the 
watch, as were also Tison and his wife behind the glazed 
partition. 

The meal at an end, everyone withdrew to his or her 
quarters. Louis XVI redescended with his son and, in his 
bedroom, gave the child a geography lesson. Clery re- 
mained on the third floor to do the ladies' hair, after which 
he returned to the lower story to occupy himself with 
the Dauphin, whom he was teaching writing and gram- 
mar. The little Prince had a very alert mind and those 
exercise books of his which have been preserved show 
great application and constant progress. After studying 
he took his recreation in the anteroom, the King's door 
remaining open. From the corner of his fireplace, where 
he installed himself, Louis XVI watched his son at play. 
The municipal representative, ordinarily sitting near the 
stove in the embrasure of the window, continued his long 
duty, sleeping or reflecting. There is no need "to read 
between the lines" of the reports addressed by the com- 
missioners of the Temple to the General Council of the 
Commune, or the narrations which a few of them have 
left behind, to discern their amazement at finding them- 
selves there and at what they saw. The fact of being 
able to approach under such circumstances that King 
and Queen whom but a few months before they had re- 
garded from below as idols they considered an event in 
their existence. Not one of them escaped from this im- 
pression, neither the mason Mercereau, nor the contemp- 
tible Dorat-Cubieres, nor even the ignoble and knavish 
Hebert. In the case of the fanatics this feeling was be- 
trayed by an afl^ectation of coarseness or redoubled ani- 
mosity;^ but how many others — shop-keepers, employees 

^ Here is how Hubert, in the autumn of 1792, related to the readers 
of P^re Duchesne his turn on guard at the Temple: — "My turn came 

60 



THE COMMUNE 

and people of the lower middle-classes — felt manifest con- 
fusion at the part they were clumsily playing, suddenly 
seized with unacknowledged contrition by the sight of 
that crushing misfortune supported with so simple a resig- 
nation and so rapid and natural an adaptation. 

The fact is, the prisoners' attitude toward the commis- 
sioners of the Commune revealed itself as very different 
from that they expected. Historians of the drama of the 
Temple, through the necessity of synthetising perhaps, or 
blinded by a party spirit, have generally shown the 

— f outre! to go, in the quality of municipal representative, and keep 
guard over tlie Temple menagerie. I took delight in examining the 
wild beasts. First of all, picture to yourself the Rhinoceros, foaming 
with rage at finding himself enchained and panting with the thirst 
for blood with which he is devoured. There you have, feature for 
feature, the resemblance to Louis the Traitor, snoring at night like 
a sv/ine on its dung-heap, and during the day doing nothing but 
grumble, joyous only when he sees the stew coming, devouring a 
fattened pullet at a mouthful whilst saying to himself: 'If I could 
only do the same with a Jacobin, a sans-culotte!' As to the Austrian 
woman, she is no longer that tigress who swam in the torrents of 
blood she spilt on St. Lawrence's day. She has assumed the treach- 
erous face of a cat; she has an air of mewing meekly; she has 
drawn in her claws the better to choose her time and still give a few 
scratches. The little monkeys engendered by this harridan frisk and 
gambol to amuse those who surround them, but, f outre! these hairy 
bougres will not allow themselves to be made fun of; they know he 
belongs to the monsters who can never be tamed. ... I was forgetting 
M. Veto's sister. She's a tall strapping woman who appears to have 
a good appetite. It's a pity — f outre! — she was born of such a race. 
She has more the air of a big miller's wife than that of an ex- 
princess. She must have been made by some strong fellow of the 
markets or by a big lout. Instead of pretending to be proud be- 
cause, so 'tis said, she sprang from the blood of kings, she ought 
on the contrary to disown that impure blood in order to marry 
a payer of arrears who would not make children for her on the 
sly. . . . As soon as he (Capet) perceived me near his bedside on 
awakening, he made me a friendly sign and wished to begin a con- 
versation about the rain and the fine weather. But, f outre! I made 
him reserve his honeyed words by keeping silent. . . His wife made 
eyes at me without effect; she also was at the end of her resources; 
and they would have continued to think I had become dumb had 
they not heard me sing the Carmagnole and the song of the Mar- 
seillais. . . . What disgusted me whilst I was there was to see this 
wretched race leading as merry a life in prison as in the past. We 
must reduce these man-eaters to haricot beans and potatoes, other- 
wise — f outre! — equality is but an idle fancy. We must promptly 
bring Louis the Traitor to trial, in order not to keep so many people 
on foot and make such a show in guarding a measly pig. . . ." Le 
Pere Duchesne, No. 173. 

61 



THE DAUPHIN 

personages as stiff as the heroes of a tragedy and have 
painted them, as is said, "all of a piece": haughty en- 
durance and impassable coldness on the part of the royal 
family ; insolence without respite and base cruelty on the 
part of all its guardians ; unless, for the requirements 
of a contrary thesis, the latter were not represented to 
us as models of republican austerity and uprightness and 
the prisoners as malevolent and impenitent knaves, un- 
grateful for the material well-being they owed to the gen- 
erosity of the triumphant people. The truth is less clean- 
cut, as well as more consistent with the psychology of 
both. First of all, one would not have found daily, among 
the two hundred and eighty-eight members of the insur- 
rectional Commune and the hundred and forty-four mem- 
bers of the municipal assemblies which followed it, so 
many torturers or so many Brutuses; then, the too ex- 
cellent man that Louis XVI was did not seem to lay up 
against his guardians the slightest malice. Did not his 
duty as a King, his conscience as a great Christian, oblige 
him to consider them as his subjects, his children, to par- 
don them, willingly, for their momentary error.? He 
sought for opportunities of holding familiar converse with 
them, and apologized if — as happened very rarely — he 
showed impatience. As to the Queen and Madame Eliza- 
beth, whose more susceptible delicacy must have suffered 
more from the lack of education and continued presence 
of these annoying commissioners, thej made efforts — some- 
times selfishly — to find in their conversation momentary 
forgetfulness and profitable relaxation. — "I did not recog- 
nise the prisoners in the haughty tone Clery attributes 
to them. . . .^ On the contrary, I found them affable, 
simple and even gay . . ." writes the municipal repre- 
sentative Verdier; and numerous little facts confirm his 
assertion. It was Marie Antoinette who, on seeing an 
evidently embarrassed "fresh-arrival" enter, said to him 
kindly: "Draw near, sir; you will be able to see to read 
^In his memoirs. 

62 



THE COMMUNE 

much better where we are.'* — It was Madame Elizabeth 
who came and leaned on the back of a chair occupied by 
a commissioner and began to sing an arietta. — Again it 
was the Queen who, having taken from a drawer "a few 
curl-papers," unfolded them before the commissioner to 
show him her children'^s hair. Then she rubbed her hands 
with a perfume and passed them in front of his face so 
that he could smell "the very sweet odour" of her favourite 
scent.^ If the municipal officer had already been on guard 
at the Temple he was welcomed, on being recognised, with 
an amiable "we are very glad to see you," Later the old 
harpischord which was in Madame Elizabeth's bedroom 
was to give rise to little diverting gatherings. A repre- 
sentative of the Commune having struck a few notes on 
the instrument and found it to be horribly out of tune, 
it was repaired the same day, and when the commissioners 
on duty were "regular comers" little concerts were given 
there.^ 

The little Dauphin found grace in the eyes of the most 
arrogant. His prettiness, beauty, vivacity and intelli- 
gence charmed even those demagogues who were reputed 
to be the most irreducible. Hebert, when he was not writ- 
ing for the subscribers of his ignoble journal, did not 
hide the interest which this son of Kings inspired in him. 
"I've seen the little child of the Tower," he said one day 
at a dinner at Pache's. "He is as beautiful as the day 
and as interesting as can be. He plays the king marvel- 
lously well. I'm fond of playing a game of draughts with 
him. The day before yesterday he asked me if the people 
were still unhappy. 'That's a great pity,' he replied 

* Goret, passim. 

' This harpsichord is not put down in the Temple inventories. Per- 
haps, like most of the other furniture of the Big Tower, it came from 
the Temple Palace, the former residence of the Prince de Conti. It 
would be curious if the harpsichord of the royal prison were found 
to be that which is depicted in Ollivier's picture in the Louvre, and 
on which Mozart played, at this very Temple, on the occasion of 
the chamber concerts of the gallant prince. 

63 



THE DAUPHIN 

after I had answered in the affirmative." ^ In a pretty 
costume, — a grayish green kerseymere coat, a shirt collar 
that left the neck free and fell on to the shoidders, a frill 
of pleated lace, a waistcoat of white dimity, and trousers 
of similar cloth to that of the coat, — with his beautiful 
flaxen hair, laughing eyes, lively countenance and clear 
voice, the Dauphin ran about in the anteroom which, 
when they did not descend to the garden, served as his 
playground. There, unconcerned by the commissioners, 
he played at battledore and shuttlecock, or nine-pins ; he 
seemed to understand the disarming power of his eight 
years, the touching prestige of his innocence. On pos- 
terity he exercises the same attraction and chroniclers 
have taken unfair advantage of this to attribute to him 
profound replies and attitudes of indomitable pride which 
have travestied his childish physiognomy. So many mani- 
festly invented "sayings" of the unfortunate recluse of 
the Temple have been quoted that the historian must re- 
gard this too attractive chronicle with distrust. We shall 
set down here only those collected by contemporaries or 
witnesses of his lamentable existence. In truth, he was 
a child of singular precocity; "he knew quite well that he 
was in prison and watched by enemies."" But, for fear of 
afflicting his father or dear mamma, whom he adored, he 
made no allusion to anything unusual which had happened 
in his life, and never spoke of either the Tuileries or Ver- 
sailles." He also was curious to know who the jailors 
of the day would be. When he recognised one of them to 
be among those who showed deference and pity toward 
the royal family, he ran to the Queen and announced the 
news to her: "Mamma, to-day it's Monsieur So-and-so. 
. . ." ^ He showed no fear of these men with tricoloured 
scarves, but approached them without timidity, hoping to 

^Correspondance de d'Antraignes, quoted by M. A. Mathiez in 
Conspiration de I'Etranger, p. 204. 
'Clery. 
'Clery. 

64 



THE COMMUNE 

be able to make a favourable report to his parents of the 
welcome he had received. One day, having drawn near 
very quietly, he looked at the title of the volume which a 
commissioner seated in the anteroom was holding in his 
hand, and, overjoyed by his discovery, returned very rap- 
idly to whisper in the ear of that great reader of Latin 
authors, the King: "Papa, that gentleman over there is 
reading Tacitus."^ 

Clery reports a touching and certainly authentic anec- 
dote. He used to put the young prince to bed about nine 
o'clock, then withdraw to make room for the Queen and 
princesses who came to kiss the child in his bed. Later 
he returned to prepare the King's bed. One evening, Ma- 
dame Elizabeth, on wishing her nephew good-night, 
slipped into his hand a little box of lozenges, saved from 
the commissioners' searches, and asked him to give it to 
Clery who had a cold. On that particular day Louis 
XVI sat up late, reading and praying in his turret, so 
that the valet did not open the King's bed until eleven 
o'clock. Whilst doing this he heard the Dauphin calling 
to him in a low voice. Uneasy at finding he was not 
yet asleep, Clery expressed his surprise. "The fact is," 
explained the child, "my aunt gave me this box for you 
and I did not want to go to sleep until I had done so. . . . 
You were just in time . . . my eyes had already closed 
several times. . . ." 

That act, which already foreshadowed a strength of 
will out of the ordinary, may be compared with another 
related by a gazetteer of the period who probably heard 
it from one of the commissioners on duty. On one occa- 
sion, at dinner, the Dauphin looked with a longing air 
at an apple, whereupon Madame Elizabeth said to him : 
"You appear to desire that apple, and yet you don't ask 
for it?" — "Aunt," he replied in a serious tone, "my char- 
acter is frank and firm. Had I desired that apple I 

* Moelle. 

65 



THE DAUPHIN 

should have asked for it at once." ^ It was not that he 
was not, like all children, fond of dessert. After his 
father's example he had a great fondness for brioche. 
On a certain day one was placed on the table and he re- 
ceived his share. When the remains of the cake were about 
to be removed from the table the Dauphin exclaimed : "If 
you like. Mamma, I will show you a cupboard where you 
can lock up the remains of the brioche." — "And where is 
that cupboard.'"' asked the Queen. — "Here," replied the 
Dauphin, pointing to his mouth.^ 

These meals, which, at two o'clock, assembled the whole 
of the royal family in the small fireless dining-room on the 
second floor, were served luxuriously. The table — after 
the municipal representatives had explored underneath to 
make sure that no conspirator was hidden there ^ — was 
covered with fine table-linen from the linen-room of the 
Temple Palace ; ■* the silver placed on it was suffi- 
cient ;^ and the menu, on ordinary days, included three 
soups and two courses consisting of four entrees, two 
roasts each of three pieces, and four entremets. On Fri- 
days, ember-days or on the eve of feasts, they served 
four meatless entrees, three or four with meat, two roasts 
and four or five entremets,^ As dessert there were "a 
plate of pastry," three compotes, three plates of fruits 
and three pats of butter. The King alone drank wine 
and very moderately, so there was placed within his 

^Courrier franqais, December 28th, 1792. 

^B4volution de Paris, December 26th, 1792. 

^Turgy. 

*"Two large damask tablecloths at 500 livres each . . .," etc. . 
National Archives, AA 53, 1486, The linen was marked G.P. (Grand 
Priory). 

°"A soup tureen, 18 double covers, 4 ragout spoons, 1 soup-spoon, 
8 tea-spoons, 1 for the powdered sugar, etc." National Archives, 
AA 53, 1486. 

*Verdier's report. Buchez and Roux, XXII, p. 355. Madame 
Royale writes: "My aunt kept the whole of Lent (in 1794) strictly 
eating hardly enough to keep herself alive. She had no breakfast, 
at luncheon only a bowl of coffee, and at dinner some bread." 
Verdier in his report notes that the King was scrupulously abstinent 
on fast days, but not the Queen nor the two princesses. 

66 



THE COMMUNE 

reach a bottle of champagne and three decanters con- 
taining Bordeaux, Malmsey and Madeira wines. The 
other diners drank only water. The Queen was served 
with a certain water from Ville d'Avray which she pre- 
ferred to all others.^ Louis XVI cut up the meat and his 
skill was remarkable.^ Pies and — as we have seen — 
brioche were his favourite viands. Clery ordered them 
every week and they were served two days in succession.^ 
During the meal the municipal representatives stood on 
guard and always with covered heads. The King con- 
versed with them, "talking to the lawyers and doctors 
about Greek and Latin authors, and to the workmen 
about their calling."^ Sometimes certain commissioners, 
through stupidity or fear, became annoying. One of 
them had the macaroons broken to see if a note were not 
hidden inside; whilst another ordered that the peaches 
be opened in his presence and the stones be cracked.^ 

When Louis XVI rose from table he took care that the 
dishes were placed very exactly in the stove in the ante- 
room for Clery's luncheon and he pointed out to him "those 
which had seemed to him to be the best."^ Then, standing 
near this stove,^ he drank his coffee, the others playing 

* Bill for Ville d'Avray water and ice supplied for use at the 
Temple by order of the canteen-keeper Gagnie, and brought by 
Guermont's carriage from Versailles to Paris. National Archives, 
F", 4393, document 266. Each transport cost 10 livres; there were 
from nine to ten per month. / 

=* Moelle. / 

" Clery. / 

* Clery. 

^ The same. 

" The same. The royal family acted in the same manner toward all 
its servants. At the time when M. Hue was still at the Temple, the 
municipal representative Daujon wrote: "I was singularly surprised 
at the acts of courtesy and little attentions bestowed by Marie 
Antoinette on him (Hue). They would not have touched a tasty 
morsel without M. Hue having his share of it. 'You like this, so we 
have kept some of it for you.' Absent or present, he was ever the 
subject of their thoughts. 'He gives himself so much trouble! He 
is so obliging!' I believe she would have waited upon him had she 
dared." 

' Clery writes "near the large stove of the dining-room." Manifestly 
an error. There was neither stove nor fire-place in the dining-room. 
The Queen and Madame Elizabeth doubtless also took coffee. Ver- 

67 



THE DAUPHIN 

a hand at piquet, a game of draughts or backgammon, 
whilst the children resumed their noisy frolics. If the 
commissioners were playing among themselves at dominoes 
the King would draw near, turn the game topsy-turvy, 
and amuse himself by raising fragile constructions, very 
adroitly built, by means of the little blocks of ivory and 
ebony.^ Or else he walked backward and forward, from 
the end of his room to the door of the staircase; and 
raising his eyes toward the top of the window, obstructed 
outside by a chimney funnel made of boards, asked what 
the weather was like.^ At four o'clock he withdrew to his 
room to rest, the little prince returned to his lessons, and 
the princesses ascended to their apartment until the din- 
ner hour. 

Under this innocent outward show, these regularly 
commonplace habits, were hidden a number of artifices. 
Notwithstanding their constantly anxious distrust, the 
commissioners were duped by their prisoners. Under the 
very eyes of their guardians, the Queen and Madame 
Elizabeth received news from the outside, exchanged com- 
munications and were kept accurately informed regarding 
political events. The waiter Turgy was the inventor of a 
telegraphic language, understandable only to initiates. 
Should it happen that, whilst carrying out his duties in 
the course of a meal, he rubbed his right eye, — that sig- 
nified that the armies of the Republic were in retreat. 
When he passed his hand through his hair, this meant 
that the Convention was occupying itself with the royal 
family ; and so on. . . . The right hand was reserved for 
favourable news, every gesture with the left hand signi- 
fying a bad one. Turgy even passed notes. As little 
white paper caps were used, instead of corks, over the 
tops of the milk of almonds decanters, an agreed-upon 
sign informed the princesses that one of these papers 

dier's report mentions four cups served after each meal, one of 
them, evidently, for Clery. 

^Goret. 

^The same. 

68 



THE COMMUNE 

bore some message or other traced with sympathetic ink 
— lemon juice or extract of gall-nut. — Either when pass- 
ing the dishes or by other stratagems, he slipped notes 
into Madame Elizabeth's hand, or hid them in the hot-air 
grating of the stove. ^ 

This correspondence never slacked from August, 1792 
to September, 1793. The animated games of the Dauphin 
and his sister, romping about the anteroom, the prisoners' 
affability toward the municipal warders were so many 
means of diverting the latters' attention and exchanging 
some secret rapidly. Moreover, Clery often received visits 
from his wife. Generally she was accompanied by one of 
her friends, Mme. Beaumont, whom she introduced as a 
relative. The only place where Clery was allowed to 
speak to her was in the Council Chamber and in the 
presence of the warders, but in an agreed-upon language 
he entrusted the two women with commissions and re- 
ceived precious information from them. Through the 
agency of these two were engaged the services of "the 
hawker" who every day came to the environs of the 
Temple to shout in the silence of the night the news of 
the day.^ 

This Council Chamber was the headquarters of the 
superintendence of the Temple. First of all installed in 
the palace, it was transferred to the Tower at the begin- 
ning of December 1792. It occupied the sole room on the 
ground floor, a huge chamber with an area of about 60 
metres and the Gothic arches of which descended to a 
massive central column. Placed there were four beds 
for the commissioners, their desk, the desk reserved for 
Clery, and nine cupboards, including that in which were 
kept, under lock and key, the registers in which the 
municipal officers set down their deliberations and copied 
their correspondence with the Hotel de Ville.^ Bells 

* Turgy. 
» Clery. 

' "The commissioners on guard at the King's must keep an account 
diary of all that happens there." — General Council of the Commune, 

69 



THE DAUPHIN 

connected the Council Chamber with the prisoners' apart- 
ments, as well as with the first floor of the Tower, occu- 
pied by the guard — some forty citizen-soldiers who slept 
on camp-beds.^ It was also in the Council Chamber that 
the municipal representatives had their meal with the 
officers of the national guard on duty at the prison, — a 
total of ten or twelve covers.^ At first they had resource 
to the services of an eating-house keeper who, for the sum 
of four livres a day, supplied breakfast, luncheon and din- 
ner, with the addition of a small cup of coffee or a glass 
of brandy ; ^ but there were complaints, so the Commune 
decided that the prisoners' kitchens should also cook for 
the Temple Council. This was a piece of rare good for- 
tune for certain of these men, little accustomed to care- 
fully prepared food.^ Prudence dictated that a bottle of 
spirits for the whole company should be served only at 
the end of the meal, but the refusal of some was to the ad- 
vantage of those fond of alcohol. On one occasion Lepitre 
saw the municipal representative Lechenard ^ swallow a 
pint at a draught before ascending to mount guard in 
the Queen's anteroom. The next day his bed and the floor 
of the room "bore witness to his intemperance." When 
Marie Antoinette opened her door at eight in the morning 

sitting of August 21st, 1792.— "The Council decrees that the Temple 
registers must be transcribed in the presence of the commissioners 
by a confidential clerk entrusted with this work, and that these 
registers be deposited in the Archives of the Commune." — Commune 
of Paris, sitting of the third day of the second month of the year 
11 (October 24th, 1793). The Temple registers existed, then, in the 
form of originals and copies. 

^ "For the camp-beds of the guard on the first floor, six strong 
iron straps. . ., etc." Bill from Durant, locksmith. National 
Archives, F 4, 1306. — "A large cast-iron stove, square. . ." Bill from 
Marguerite & Firino, stove-dealers. National Archives, the same file. 

' Lepitre. 

^ Verdier's Tableau historique. — "In the beginning the food was 
so unwholesome that we always left the table with colic; it was 
only a few months later that it became the same as that served to the 
prisoners." Daujon's narrative. 

* Lepitre. 

" Jean Francois Lechenard, tailor. Bon Conseil section. Thirty-five 
years old in 1792. 

70 



THE COMMUNE 

she recoiled in terror, crying to Madame Elizabeth : "Sis- 
ter, don't leave your room !" 

This was doubtless an isolated case, yet it was rumoured 
in Paris that they lived well at the commissioners' table 
and indulged in libations of a nature to compromise their 
dignity. In October, 1792, there was "the Orgy of the 
Temple" affair, on which we are not very well informed. 
It seems to be proved that, at the close of the dinner, the 
lights were put out and the punch lit; that the coffee- 
house keeper who supplied the brandy was there "with 
his wife"; that he "disguised his face," and that Citizen 
James, one of the commissioners, a geometrician and pro- 
fessor of English, being overjoyed by this little fete, 
wished to play leap-frog and passed over the head of his 
colleague Jerome.^ "The Orgy of the Temple" caused 
a big scandal, but Chaumette, already anxious at that 
time to maintain silence about everything which happened 
at the royal prison, proposed to the General Council "to 
bury the affair, which, according to him, was but a fresh 
means of sullying the Revolution." ^ Nevertheless, tra- 
dition establishes the fact that they ate copiously in the 
Temple Council Chamber, that they came there expressly 
to regale themselves. At the sitting of the Commune on 
November 28th, Marino ^ fulminated against "certain 
members of the Convention who, recently sent to the 
Temple, ventured to partake of cheer so good that it was 
insulting; amongst others Gorsas," he specified, "whom I 
myself have seen filling his paunch.""* Already Manuel had 

^Nicolas Jerome, turner, 213 Rue Saint-Jacques-la-Boucherie. Ar- 
cis section. 

^Braesch's Commune du 10 aout, p. 1101. 

^Marino Jean Baptiste, pewter and china-dealer. No. 198 Maison 
Egalite, Montague section. 

*Courrier frangais of November 30th, quoted by Braesch. "It 
was also necessary to forbid entering the Temple those parasitic ex- 
members of the Commune of August 10th who, without anything 
justifying their presence, and with no other title than the fear they 
inspired, were in the habit of coming to take their meals at the 
Council's table." Moelle. 

71 



THE DAUPHIN 

democratically proposed to replace the whole kitchen at- 
tached to the prison "by a single woman who, in a citizen- 
like manner, would have put on the pot-au-fer daily, as 
much for the prisoners as for their warders." ^ But with 
that low diet the Council Chamber would have lost its 
chief attraction, and nobody would have been found to 
consent to guard the "precious hostages." 

For, in general, the members of the Commune, once the 
vanity of playing a part had been satisfied, did not show 
themselves very eager in the carrying out of their duties. 
There was a time when the General Council had to send 
gendarmes to fetch those of its members whom it had 
chosen to go to the Temple. Even the sittings of the 
Commune were deserted, as, for instance, on a certain 
evening when, out of two hundred and eighty-eight munici- 
pal representatives, only nineteen were sitting at the 
Hotel de Ville.^ These sorry people had quickly tired of 
their ephemeral glory, and that explains the sort of in- 
difference with which, in the majority of cases, they 
carried out sentry-duty near the dethroned King. If 
we make an exception of certain fanatics, such as the stone- 
cutter Mercereau,^ who, in a leather apron and "the 
filthiest clothes," settled himself on the Queen's sofa and 
monopolised the place opposite the King's fire-place, or 
Jacques Roux, an ex-priest, who, whilst on guard in the 
"women's" anteroom, sang at the top of his voice the whole 
night,^ the others went there without curiosity, as with- 
out enthusiasm, — wearied by an unpleasant task from 
which they did not derive the hoped-for satisfaction. 
More lacking in ability than vicious, they were obedient 
to the impulsion they received. As one of them, Jean 

^Verdier. Tableau historique and Courrier franqais, November 
30th. 

^Braesch's Commune du 10 aout, p. 1104. 

^Mercereau, Rene Charles, Rue des Armandiers, French Panthdon 
section. Regarding Mercereau, see C16ry and Lepitre. Mercereau 
presided over the sitting of the General Council of the Commune on 
December llth 1792. Beaucourt, CXXX. 

^Lepitre. 

72 



THE COMMUNE 

Chevalier, confessed: "We are an ommum gatherum of 
men, almost the majority of whom are inept. Some of 
these are honest men, others have no other principles 
than those of unbridled democracy, and a few are real 
scoundrels. One must, in general, speak their language. 
. . ." -^ Moelle, referring specially to the Temple Coun- 
cil to which he belonged on various occasions, wrote: "I 
saw there hardly any other save honest but weak men, 
controlled by fear and events." ^ Unfortunately, when 
these pitiable demagogues were assembled at the Hotel 
de Ville and subjected to the disorderly eloquence of Chau- 
mette or the suspicious glance of Hebert they thought it 
their duty to show that "they were not behindhand," to 
rival them in cynicism, stupidity and meanness. They had 
their revenge then for the embarrassed, almost shame- 
faced attitude they maintained in the presence of the 
Temple prisoners, and inveighed at a distance against 
that unfortunate Queen and King whom, when near, they 
dared to annoy but timidly. The reading of the Temple 
reports at the Commune led every night to higher bidding 
in cowardly coarseness. They set their wits to work to 
designate Louis XVI under the most grotesque nick- 
names: "Louis the Last," "Louis the Traitor," "Louis 
of the Tower," "the royal individual". . . . The first per- 
son who applied to him the ridiculous appellation of 
"Monsieur Capet" was certainly understood by only a 
very small number; but it raised a laugh and scored the 
greatest success.^ At one time it was Charbonnier, a 
hosier, who, doubtless having heard the Dauphin recite 
to his mother the Imprecations of Camille or some other 
passage from a classical poet, reported that the ex-Queen 
and her ex-sister-in-law "taught the child only the most 
bloody tragedies" ; and he concluded : "they are so volup- 

^Verdier. Tableau historique. 

^Six joumees passees au Temple. 

^It was at the sitting of the General Council of the Commune of 
September 3rd- 1792, that this insult seems to have been used for the 
first time. 

73 



THE DAUPHIN 

tuous that there is not a fUle of the Rue Saint-Jean-Saint- 
Denis who can be compared to them." ^ At another it 
was a municipal representative who, perhaps unable to 
read, expressed indignation at the number of works in 
Latin asked for by the King. "He is assured of hardly 
a fortnight's existence and the books he demands would 
suffice to occupy the longest life. ..." A third criticised 
the ancient authors whose works were placed in the hands 
of the little Capet. — "Authors whom we ought to cast far 
from us because of our new ideas." Let him be given 
rather "the life of Cromwell, that of Charles IX and the 
details of the massacre of St. Bartholomew's Day !" One 
evening the physician Leclerc, after reporting that the 
daughter of Louis XVI was afflicted with an eruption on 
her cheek, added: "It would be a pity if this eruption 
remained, for the girl Capet has a pretty face ; it is a 
masterpiece of Nature. . . ." The president was furious 
and protested: "The serpent's skin is also a masterpiece 
of Nature." ^ And when the King was suffering and the 
bulletin drawn up by his doctors was read, Hebert de- 
manded in the name of Equality "that they also read the 
bulletin of all the sick prisoners. . . ." One would like to 
know the name of the municipal representative who, feeling 
ashamed for Paris on account of so many absurdities and 
imbecilities, dared one night to say before the whole Com- 
mune : "Formerly there existed flatterers of Kings ; but 
now that Kings are no more, there are flatterers of the 
people. I never belonged to the former and still less shall 
I be among the latter." ^ 

Thus, each day brought, by the malignant instigation 
of the Commune, a fresh humiliation or a refinement of 
torture. On December 11th, as Louis XVI was giving 

^In his stupidity the hosier went too far and was hooted. Cour- 
rier franqais of October 28th, 1793, sitting of the General Council 
of the 26th. The Journal notes: "By its murmurs the General Council 
disapproved of these last words which at one and the same time 
offend humanity and decency." 

'Courrier frangais of November 22nd, 1792, quoted by Braesch. 

^Courrier frangais of November 25th, 1792, quoted by Braesch. 

74 



THE COMMUNE 

his son a reading lesson — the last one ! — two municipal 
representatives appeared and announced that they had 
come to fetch the young Louis to take him to his mother. 
The King embraced a long time the child whom he was to 
see no more before the heart-rending interview of January 
20th. On that evening, whilst, in the little dining-room, 
all the royal family in tears pressed close against the 
condemned man ; whilst, in the anteroom, the silent com- 
missioners watched through the panes ; whilst, in the tur- 
ret adjoining the King's bedroom, the Abbe de Firmont 
absorbed himself in his prayers to endeavour not to hear 
the cries of sorrow which reached him; ^ whilst the little 
Dauphin, choking with tears, implored the commissioners 
to allow him to go and ask pardon, on his knees, of the 
gentlemen of the Paris sections "so that his father should 
not die ;" ^ whilst, at the other side of Paris, men were 
digging a grave in a snow-covered garden,^ the Commune, 
at last reaching the goal toward which all its efforts 
had been directed for five months, declared that it would 
hold permanent sittings the whole of the next day. Its 
triumph, however, was joyless. Although Chaumette pre- 
sided, consternation reigned over the assembly. If we 
make an exception of the fanatics, who affected a swagger- 
ing attitude, the others, terrified at what they had done, 
hardly dared to look at each other. "Why put HIM to 
death"; they said, "why not send him to Austria.'' He 
will do no more harm than those of his family who are 
there." * Yet no one had the boldness to protest. What 
was the good.^ "They feared that a sad and dejected air 
would offend the defiant eye of the rascals."^ When 
they proceeded to appoint commissioners to be on duty 

^Account by the Abbe Edgeworth de Firmont. 

'La Revolution de 92, journal de la Convention nationale, January 
21st, 1793. 

^General Council of the Commune, sitting of January 20th. Report 
of the burial of Louis Capet. National Archives, CC. 853. The order 
to prepare the grave had been given on the 20th to M. Picavez, 
Cure of the Madeleine. 

^Goret. 

''Lepitre. 

75 



THE DAUPHIN 

at the Temple on the 21st, extreme repugnance was mani- 
fested."^ It was much more than that when it was neces- 
sary to select two members of the Commune to attend the 
execution. The report bears traces of the movement of 
terror with which the motion was received ; it was proposed 
that lots be drawn, — and this was adopted, but immedi- 
ately they changed their minds. And so Bernard and 
Jacques Iloux" "who offered themselves spontaneously," 
were appointed "by acclamation."^ The next day, when, 
at dawn, after a rainy night resounding with the sinister 
beating of drums to arms, the permanent sittings began, 
"but a small number of municipal representatives, all in 
mournful silence,"^ were on the benches. Perhaps, on 
that tragic morning, the most short-sighted realised, as 
Beaudrais wrote later, "that the Commune had not come 
off with honour during the whole of the time the prisoners 
at the Temple had been under supervision; it had failed 
to reconcile what it owed to humanity and adversity with 
the precautions necessitated by those committed to their 
keeping; up to the last moment they gave the devout Capet 
ground for believing himself to be a predestined martyr 
and for praising himself on account of the bad behaviour 
they never ceased to show toward him. . . ."^ The im- 
pression of terror — perhaps remorse — was so general 
that, during the two hours of terribly anxious waiting 
which elapsed between the departure from the Temple and 
the fall of the royal head, and with courriers charged to 
inform the Council of the slightest incidents on the route 
continually arriving, the assembly beheld with stupefac- 
tion the crazy Hebert, giving way to his nerves, suddenly 
burst into sobs. And as an excuse for his weakness he 
said: "The tyrant was very fond of my dog; he often 
patted it. That comes to my mind now. . . ."^ 

* Moelle. 

^ Report of January 20th. 
' Goret. 

* The same. 

° Les Revolutions de Paris, No. 185. 

' Buchez and Roux. Histoire parlementaire, XXIII, p. 313. 

76 



Ill 



PLOTS 



If that sombre day, January 21st ^ was lived by Paris 
in a state of stupor, it passed on the third story of the 
Tower in anguish and despair. At six in the morning 
the prisoners heard a knocking at their door. Someone 
had come to ask for "Mme. Tison's prayer-book for the 
King's mass." ^ Later they distinguished the noise of a 
great stir in the staircase and courtyards, and at half 
past ten distant volleys of artillery ^ and shouting in the 
streets dispelled their last illusions. We have some indi- 
cation that at that solemn and terrible moment the suf- 
focating Queen, raising her son who, in agonized prayer, 
was pressing against her knees, saluted him as King of 
France, according to ancient custom, and such, in that 
narrow chamber, echoing with sobs and cries of sorrow,* 
was the coronation of that child whose little fair head was 
never to wear the crown of France.^ Outside France all 

^Although certain journals contend that the event made no change 
whatever in the customary appearance of Paris and that "the people 
were on a level with their sovereignty," others confess the deep 
impression produced by the King's execution. "Silence and terror 
everywhere. . . ." Semaine parisienne. — "A mournful stupor reigned 
throughout the city. . . ." Annates de la Bepublique franqais. — "A 
frigid calm reigns to-day. . . ." La Revolution de 92. — "It is useless to 
hide the fact — Paris is plunged in stupor. . . ." Journal franqais. 

^Madame Royale. 

=Clery. 

^"The Queen was choking with sorrow, the young prince burst into 
tears, Madame Royale uttered piercing cries. . ." Turgy. 

^Madame Royale says nothing about this scene, the reality of which 
can be inferred only from a phrase written by Turgy twenty-four 
years later. This was in 1817, when Mathurin Bruneau, one of the 
numerous pretenders to the quality of "the Dauphin who escaped 
from the Temple," was living in the prisons of Rouen. Turgy, who 
was then valet and usher of the boudoir to Madame Royale, who 

77 



THE DAUPHIN 

governments welcomed him with the traditional cry : 
"The King is dead, long live the King !" and even in Paris 
a paper, Le Veridique, dared to print the following: "It 
is certain that the common wishes of the Nation and the 
majority of the people of Europe neither favour a French 
Republic nor believe in the possibility of a republic in 
France. They believe that the death of Louis XVI has 
made one saint more, and a new King. Some day we shall 
occupy ourselves with the saint ; let us attend to the most 
pressing matter — the King. . , . This King is the son of 
Louis XVI; the only thing to do is to appoint a regent 
for him." Perhaps, from that day, the alluring perspec- 
tive of such a regency began to fascinate some of the 
favourites of the Revolution who, intoxicated with their 
popularity, were already dreaming of fabulous destinies 
and foresaw the tutelage of the little King of the Temple 
as a goal accessible to their worth and renown. 

After the King's departure for the scaffold, Clery took 
refuge in his bedroom in tears. The Queen asked for him 
several times, but it was pointed out to her that Clery 

had become the Duchesse d'Angouleme, retained some doubt regarding 
the death of the son of Louis XVI, for he thought fit to put seven 
questions to the prisoner of Rouen. According to the more or less 
accurate manner in which Bruneau replied to them, Turgy, or those 
who had urged him to take this very imprudent step, took the right 
to base his opinion on the pretender. His first question was as 
follows: "What occurred on January 21st when they heard the 
guns being fired? What did your aunt say then and what did they 
do for you out of the ordinary?" National Archives F^ 6979. 
If we refer to Turgy's narration, published only in 1818, that is one 
year after the Bruneau trial, we read: "The execrable January 
21st arrived. About ten in the morning the Queen wished to per- 
suade her children to take some food. . . ." We may conclude from 
this that Turgy had, as usual, brought in the breakfast and that, 
stationed in the anteroom waiting until the royal family in tears 
consented to approach the table, he witnessed a scene of which he 
does not speak in his Recollections. Moreover, we shall see that, from 
January 21st, young Louis XVII was treated as a King by his 
mother, aunt and sister, and such are the indications which allow one 
to suppose that "what was done, that morning, for the Dauphin 
out of the ordinary" was a sort of coronation of his new-born 
royalty. 

78 



PLOTS 

being "in a terrible state" could not come before her.-^ 
However, about noon, he descended to the Council Cham- 
ber and declared to the commissioners that the King, 
on leaving his bedroom, had handed him several objects 
intended for the Queen. Clery placed them on the com- 
missioners' table. They consisted of Louis XVIth's wed- 
ding-ring," a silver watch-seal and finally "a little packet" 
on which the condemned man had written "hair of my wife, 
sister and children." ^ At five in the evening the commis- 
sioners placed seals on the doors of the King's apartment,* 
but not without having first of all authorised Clery to take 
the linen which belonged to him, as well as that of the 
Dauphin, from the cupboards. They then installed the 
valet, who found himself without a place to live in, in 
one of the rooms of the Little Tower.^ Goret, one of the 
municipal representatives on guard that day,^ after a 
short visit to the Queen who asked him for mourning "of 
the simplest kind," went, about nine at night, to request 
Clery to come down to the Council Chamber for supper. 
Clery consented but not without reluctance. General 
Santerre with a few officers of his staff had been invited 
to the commissioners' table, and he took a delight in relat- 
ing the execution of the tyrant, going into details and 
flattering himself for his decisive beating of the drums. 

^Goret. 

^Inside this ring were engraved the initials M. A. A. A. (Marie 
Antoinette, Archduchess of Austria) and the date 19th April, 1770. 

^Temple papers. 

*Seals of green wax with impress of a seal marked with the initials 
M. T. (Maison du Temple) and a Phrygian cap. 

^Temple papers. 

'In addition to Goret there were present the mason Mercereau, — 
Douce, Louis Charles, a working builder, 33 years, Croix-Rouge 
section, — Figuet, Claude, architect, Theatre-Fran^ais section, — Beau- 
drais (or Baudrais), Jean Baptiste, man of letters, Bibliotheque 
section, — Pelletier, Francois, wine-shop keeper, 31 years, Poisson- 
nifere section, — Grouvelle, Jean Francois, jeweller-watchmaker, 
Notre-Dame section, — Minier, Alexandre, jeweller, Pont-Neuf sec- 
tion, — Jou, Alexandre, Jean Baptiste, I3on Conseil section, — Des- 
champs-Destournelles, Louis Gregoire, director general of registra- 
tion, Bibliotheque section, — Pecoul, Nicolas, linen-draper, Halles sec- 
tion, — Bourdier, Joseph Francois, doctor, 34 years, Fontaine-Grenelle 
section. 

79 



THE DAUPHIN 

Clery rose from the table and left the room on receiving 
a sign from Goret, who rejoined him in his bedroom and 
passed the night with him.^ 

The only modifications made in the Temple regulations 
in consequence of the death of Louis XVI were the reduc- 
tion of the number of commissioners ~ to six and the 
suppression of the walks in the garden, the Queen having 
refused to descend the staircase and pass in front of the 
door of the apartment her husband had inhabited. They 
did not return, then, to the little dining-room on the sec- 
ond floor, on which, moreover, seals had been placed; 
they continued to serve dinner and supper in the Queen's 
anteroom as they had done since all communication had 
been forbidden between the King and his family. The 
meals were as copious and as carefully prepared as before, 
but "less splendidly served." ^ The Queen and Madame 
Elizabeth "accorded the young prince the rank and 
pre-eminence" to which his "accession" gave him a right.* 
Tison and the commissioners did not interfere, either 
because they failed to see what was being done, or because 
the waiters — all three devoted, as we know, to the pris- 
oners — carried out their duties with discretion. One of 
them, however, Pierre Bernard ^ sat down, one day, un- 

1 Goret. 

^ General Council of the Commune, sitting of January 21st. 

' Goret. 

*The same. Le Courrier franqais of April 4th, 1793, published a 
pseudo-letter from Marie Antoinette, discovered, it was said, at 
Chantilly and addressed to the Comte de Provence who had been 
proclaimed Regent of France. Manifestly the letter is a forgery. 
In it we read, amongst other absurdities: "Since I received your 
letter I have proclaimed the Dauphin King of the French. I regard 
him as though he had been appointed by the whole nation. When 
he rises in the morning I find out from those around me if the 
King has spent a good night and if he desires breakfast. At all 
his meals he eats alone, and I, as well as his sister and aunt, set 
to work to serve him, taking our meals only after he has finished. 
When evening comes I ask if the King desires to retire to rest. 
In brief, I regard him as his deceased father was regarded in all 
the splendour of the former court . . .," etc. 

^ A sworn priest, chaplain at the Hdpital de la Pitie, and who 
must not be confused with Jacques Claude Bernard, another priest 
who also took the oath to the Civil Constitution in 1790. Pierre 
Bernard, a married man, was one of the two commissioners sent 

80 



PLOTS 

ceremoniously on the chair reserved for the little King — 
a seat higher than the others and provided with a cushion. 
Tison had to undertake to dislodge the municipal repre- 
sentative, which was no easy thing, the lout protesting 
"that he had never seen prisoners use chairs and that 
straw was good enough for them." ^ 

Thus, of the two superposed apartments, at first in- 
tended as the residence for the royal family, only one 
remained for it, and this it never left except to take the 
air from time to time on the narrow embattled platform 
which ran around the roof of the Tower.^ Eight persons 
lived in an uncomfortable and continual promiscuity in 
the four small rooms of the third floor. The Queen and 
her two children lived in one of the bedrooms, Madame 
Elizabeth occupied the other.^ The Tisons kept house in 
the third, and the two commissioners on guard set up their 
beds in the anteroom, where they spent the whole night 
and the whole day. As to Clery, he was to appear no 
more, notwithstanding the Queen's insistence ; he remained 
confined in a bedroom in the Little Tower, taking his 
meals in the council room.'* At the end of February he 
was ordered to leave the Temple and had to do so on 

by the Commune to the King's execution and entrusted to draw up a 
report of it. 

^ Lepitre, who records the fact, does not say that this seat had 
the appearance of a throne, but, on the contrary, that it had been 
arranged in such a manner that the child was better able to reach 
his plate. 

* They ascended there for the first time "about twelve days after 
the King's death." — Moelle. 

^ At least this appears to be so, judging by the following passage in 
the Journal de Madame Royale: "My brottier had a very high fever 
in February, 1793. My aunt had the kindness to come and take my 
place in my brother's room, so that I need not sleep in the fever- 
ladened air; she used my bed and I went to sleep in her room." 
We may, it is true, interpret these lines in another manner and admit 
that the Queen and Madame Elizabeth lived together in one of the 
two bedrooms, the other being occupied by the Dauphin and his 
sister. But apart from the fact that this combination would have 
isolated the two children in a room without direct communication 
with the first, it appears to be in contradiction with every tradition 
and all the narratives of the captivity. 

* Clery's admission to the commissioner's table, awaiting the deci- 
sion of the General Council. Temple papers XXXVII. 

81 



THE DAUPHIN 

March 1st, without seeing* either his young master or the 
prisoners again. 

During the two first months of the King's captivity, 
the Commune was very embarrassed in meeting the cost of 
the maintenance of its hostages and the transformation of 
the Temple into a State prison. In the joy of triumph 
it had not shown a niggardly spirit as regards expenses. 
Moreover, had not the Legislative Assembly, on August 
12th, voted a sum of 500,000 livres, payable in eighths 
and to be deducted from the needs of Louis XVI and 
his family until the meeting of the National Convention? 
By the middle of October the Commune had not received 
a single crown of this half-a-million ; nor, of course, had 
the King. The insurrectional Council had met the most 
pressing expenses "by expending 15,000 livres found in 
the chests ;" ^ but tradesmen, contractors and workmen 
were asking to be paid and the money was lacking. Ro- 
land, Minister of the Interior, full of rancour and ani- 
mosity toward the Paris Commune, refused "to give a 
half-penny," and to crown matters the text of the above- 
mentioned decree could not be found. In this extremity 
the Commune, considering that it was paying dear for 
the glory of being the tyrant's jailor, determined to 
restrain the architect Palloy and his colleagues who had 
been intrusted with the work at the Temple and delegated 
a commission to make a report on the situation. This 
commission was composed of two members : Antoine Simon, 
that shoe-maker, and Toussaint Charbonnier, that hosier, 
whose names have already been mentioned. 

It does not seem probable that, among its two hundred 
and eighty-eight members, the General Council was un- 
able to choose for the carrying out of this difficult and 
delicate mission representatives more qualified than these 
two persons, who were incapable of examining an estimate, 
verifying an addition, or drawing up a report. Unless 

^Verdier. Tableau historique, published by Beaucourt. 

82 



PLOTS 

their selection was made with an unavowed object, it has 
every appearance of a hoax, and it would be invaluable 
to know the name of the mysterious protector who thus 
undertook to push the cobbler Simon along the path of 
honour and profit. First of all, how can we explain the 
fact that the Theatre-Fran9ais section, itself, one of the 
most "busy" and most advanced in Paris, was unable, on 
the night of August 10th, to find as its representative at 
the Hotel de Ville a more intelligent, more decorative 
commissioner than this mean, uneducated, needy indi- 
vidual? Simon was a poor devil who had been buffeted 
about by a life full of abortive enterprises. On arriving 
from Troyes, where his father kept a butcher's stall, he 
became first of all an apprentice and then a master shoe- 
maker. Finding that he could not earn his living at this 
calling, he started in the Rue de Seine a cheap eating- 
house where he provided "food and bed"; but in order 
and competence he was equally lacking. His accounts 
were kept in such a manner that, on the occasion of the 
taking of an inventory, the experts declared "it was 
impossible for them to recognise what was owing, such 
was the confusion which reigned there." In 1766 Simon 
had married Marie Barbe Hoyau, the widow of a man 
named Munster, bringing him as a dowry a few clothes, 
very little jewellery and a daughter, who since then had 
married a master-tailor, Vanhemerlye, of the Rue des 
Mauvais-Gar9ons. After the failure of his eating-house, 
the ex-shoemaker once more took up his awl and gouge 
and set up a business on the second floor of a house in 
the Rue des Cordeliers. There he lived on expedients, 
pawning his wife's clothes, borrowing from everybody in 
the quarter, getting into debt with all the tradespeople, 
and so lacking in resources that, when Barbe Hoyau died 
at the Hotel-Dieu, on March 11th, 1786, he was obliged 
in order to bury her, or simply to drown his grief in a 
downright drunken bout, to pawn for 21 livres the re- 
mains of the deceased's wardrobe : a petticoat, a skirt and 

83 



THE DAUPHIN 

a camisole. Two years later, overwhelmed in debt, he 
married Marie Jeanne Aladame,^ "a char-woman," aged 
43, whose principal attraction was a dowry of 1,000 
livres, "as much in ready money as in clothes, linen and 
personal apparel," and — it was said — a small income 
which had been left her by a townswoman of the middle- 
classes for whom she had long "chared" in the same house 
inhabited by Simon. ^ According to the inventory drawn 
up after the death of the first wife, the shoemaker's con- 
tribution to the common estate consisted of 5,000 livres 
of debts and "a sum of twenty sous in ready money." His 
tools, valued at 38 livres, no longer belonged to him, since 
he had sold them, whilst reserving their use to a cobbler's 
apprentice in the neighbourhood.^ 

If such a man had not judged society to be badly con- 
structed, one would have had to relinquish the finding of 
men to acclaim revolutions. At the signal for general 
disorder, it is quite evident that Simon strove his hardest 
to be remarked; but it is none the less incomprehensible 
that in the section which included Danton, Camille Des- 
moulins, Brune, Marat, Chaumette, Fabre d'Eglantine, 
Legendre, and Momoro, such a declasse became a per- 
sonage and still more that, elected a member of the Com- 
mune, he was received at the Hotel de Ville as an important 
aid. From the first sittings, in fact, he was invested with 
general confidence. Important missions were reserved 
for him. On August 13th he was one of the four commis- 
sioners charged to preside over the King's removal to 
the Temple; and he it was who, on the following day, 

^Daughter of Fiacre Aladame, carpenter, and Reine-Genevifeve 
Aubert. 

'Beauchesne mentions this income, but it does not figure in the 
marriage contract of Simon and Jeanne Aladame; nor is it men- 
tioned in accounts of later date. 

'These details are extracted from the minutes of the office of M. 
Cousin, notary in Paris, whose archives contain Simon's marriage 
contract, the inventory made after the death of Marie Barbe 
Hoyau, etc. The archives of the Seine also contain a few documents 
concerning the Simon household. Domaines, 126, and Registres des 
hiens nationaux. Rue des Cordeliers. 

84! 



PLOTS 

carried to the prison the order to place all the servants 
of the royal family under arrest.^ On September 2nd the 
Commune despatched him to Bicetre and the Salpetriere to 
try and stop the massacres. He returned on the morning 
of the 4th, declaring "that he had not been able to do 
anything to influence the people's mind." ^ Later he pre- 
sided over the drawing up of the inventory of the effects 
of the prisoners butchered at Versailles.^ He was also 
among those chosen on September 29th when the question 
of transferring Louis XVI to the Big Tower arose, and 
from that day the shoemaker never left, so to speak, the 
royal prison. He was delegated by the General Council 
to go there with the hosier Charbonnier to confiscate the 
prisoners' pens, ink, paper and pencils, nay even Madame 
Royale's portfolio for drawings and the ebony or rose- 
wood rulers which the Dauphin used for his copy books. 
It was thus that he took up his quarters — still in com- 
pany with the hosier — on the ground-floor of the Tower, 
forming between them a commission of which Simon was 
elected Presidan (it was thus he wrote his new title) by 
his colleague whom he immediately appointed his secre- 
tary, inspecting the work of Palloy and Poyet, verifying 
the accounts, — he who had never known how to keep his 
own! — taking the head of the Council of Commissioners, 
ordering the walling up of doors, the strengthening of 
gates, and the filling in of ditches, busying himself in a 
hundred ways, and calling audaciously, with Manuel, on 
the Minister of the Interior in order to obtain the payment 
of the 500,000 livres which the Commune needed. Ro- 

^At the Queen's trial before the Revolutionary Tribunal, Simon, 
called as a witness, declared he had known the accused "from, Aiv- 
gust 30th last" (a manifest error; one must read at least "from 
August 30th of last year"), "the day on which I went on guard at 
the Temple for the first time." Bulletin du Tribunal r4volutionnaire, 
2nd series. No. 27, p. 107. However, it is established that Simon 
came several times to the Temple before August 30th, 1792; perhaps 
he did not get the opportunity of approaching Marie Antoinette. 
See Beaucourt, II, p. 31, and Tourneux, Proc^s-verhwux de la Com- 
mune de Paris, p. 14. 

' National Archives, F\ 4:i08. 

» The same F% 4627. 

85 



THE DAUPHIN 

land received the delegates more than coldly. He would 
not give up a single crown ; ^ but on the same day, on a 
report from the Finance Committee, the Convention "re- 
voted'* the sum already accorded by the Legislative,^ 
and the Paris Commune was at last able to pay its debts. 
The finance commissioners of the Temple, Dr. Verdier ^ 
and the wig-maker Profinet,'* immediately set to work 
and attempted to cast up an account of the expenses oc- 
casioned by the imprisonment of the royal family.^ 
They succeeded only in drawing up an outline of this work 
and in December the Commune had to appoint a fresh 
commission, composed of Cailleux,^ Moelle '^ and Toulan.^ 
The last named — an undaunted and very frank souther- 
ner — did not hesitate to declare that all these missions, 
under the pretext of examining accounts which it did not 

^ "He replied to us that, since we had set the workmen to work, 
it was for us to pay them, — that it was none of his business. We 
pointed out to him that the General Council of the Commune had 
taken steps to appoint a commission to hasten the work at the Temple 
solely on account of various intimations, as much from the Com- 
mander General as from the Temple Commission,— to which he 
replied that it was nothing to do with him. We drew his attention 
to the fact that the prisoners' safety interested all French people, 
that we had engaged these workmen with the sole object of assuring 
it and undertaken to pay them. The Minister again replied to us 
that it was nothing to do with him . . . Simon, Presidan, Charbonnier, 
Secretary." National Archives, ¥'', 4390. Quoted by Beaucourt, II, 
pp. 70-71. 

" Decree of October 4th. Moniteur of the 5th. 

' Of the Jardin des Plantes section. Verdier was the author of the 
Tableau historique often quoted in the preceding pages. 

* Forty-nine years old and of the French Guards section. He was 
soon replaced by Francois Roche, a municipal officer. 

* Temple Papers, XL. In order not to have to return to this 
question of the Temple accounts, we will here give the figures sup- 
plied by Cailleux (who replaced Verdier and Roche), and which 
show the prison budget. From August 13th, 1792, to January 31st, 
1793, the following sums were expended: — Sundry work: 190,974 1. 
7s. 5d.— Indemnities: 14,964 1. 16s.— Staff salaries: 26,107 1. 10s. 4d.— 
Kitchen expenses: 69,917 1. lis. — Maintenance of the royal family, 
clothing, linen, etc.: 34,524 1. 2s. 5d.— Total: 336,488 1. 7s. 2d. 

" Francois Cailleux, 35 years, lawyer, Poplincourt section. 

' Claude Antoine Francois Moelle, clerk at the Discounting Bank, 
municipal officer. He was the author of Six journees passies oai 
Temple, which we have frequently quoted. 

' Francois Adrien Toulan, bookseller and music-dealer, clerk at the 
Administration des Biens nationaux. 

86 



PLOTS 

examine, "went to the Temple merely to eat, as at an 



551 



mn. 

One can say as much regarding that presided over by 
Simon. The shoemaker, lodged in the Council room ^ 
from the beginning of October 1792, entered the prison- 
ers* quarters of his own free will and spoke to them 
without anyone being astonished at this derogation of 
regulations. Physically he was a robust man, despite his 
fifty-six years, somewhat hard of hearing,^ with features 
at once brutal and besotted, and wide-spread eyes like 
those of people who have a difficulty in understanding. 
His head with its straight hair was always covered with 
a round, soft old hat, and he was dressed — ^when in his 
Sunday clothes — in a cloth coat "of the national colour, 
lined with bright red" which Peigne, the mender of old 
clothes, had had "patched all over." * From a moral 
standpoint the picture is hardly more flattering. His col- 
leagues, who did not hold him in aversion, agree in pre- 
senting him as "a poor wretch without either education or 
instruction, but not so wicked as historians have wished 
to paint him" ; ^ a man with "a good foundation of sen- 
sibility, honesty and even generosity" but not "very 
clever" ; ® full of enthusiasm for liberty and equality 
"and enjoying with delight the rights they confer and 
using them toward everybody without either restraint or 
difference." '^ The portrait differs greatly from that 
which legend has accepted as authentic, but it is certainly 
a good one, for it agrees with a few episodes gathered by 
contemporaries. For instance, these show us the sullen 
shoemaker moved to tears at the despair of the Queen 
and her daughter on the day when, the King having been 

^Temple papers, XL. 

^"He was on permanent duty at the Temple," writes Goret. 
*At the enquiry of the 13th of Frimaire, year II, Simon declared 
that his "hearing was rather hard." 

■•Antoine Simon's papers. National Archives, T 05. 

=Goret. 

*Verdier. 

'The same. 

87 



THE DAUPHIN 

transferred to the Big Tower, they feared a definite 
separation. — "I believe these confounded women are go- 
ing to make me weep," exclaimed Simon, wiping his eyes ; 
and immediately, to hide his pity, he added: "Ah! you 
are weeping! You didn't weep on August 10th, when you 
held the review to assassinate the people!" — "The people 
are quite mistaken regarding our feelings," replied Marie 
Antoinette, simply.^ Soon, however, he treated "Madam 
Capet" as a good comrade. One day, on her asking for 
news of Mme, Simon, who was ill in hospital, he replied: 
"Better, thank God ! . . . It is a pleasure now to see those 
ladies of the Hotel-Dieu. They look after the patients well 
. . . they are dressed like my wife, like you, mesdames, 
neither more nor less. . . ." " On another occasion, he 
entered the apartments in a very great hurry for he 
busied himself conscientiously from morn until night. See- 
ing him in a perspiration, the Queen said: "You are very 
warm, M. Simon, will you have a glass of wine?" — "Ma- 
dam," replied the cobbler, proudly, "I do not drink like 
that with everybody." ^ Knowing that he was very oblig- 
ing, the princesses often summoned him, whereupon "he 
appeared before them boldly, saying: 'What do you de- 
sire, mesdames?' " And immediately he would endeavour 
to satisfy them. "If what they wanted was not in the 
Temple repository he hurried to the shopkeepers." One 
day the Queen said : "We are very fortunate to have that 
good M. Simon who gets us everything we want." * The 
prisoners appeared to be amused with the naivete of the 
man, and it seems indeed that everybody in the Temple 
laughed in their sleeves at his foolishness and importance, 
that he even inspired in his colleagues a sort of pity; but 
he was not feared: he was neither treacherous nor hate- 
ful ; like many of those whose lives have been unsuccessful, 
glad to find somewhat late a situation which gave him 

^C16ry and Verdier. 

"Goret. 

^Verdier. 

*Goret. 

88 



PLOTS 

the impression of being indispensable, he took himself in 
his quality of an elect of the people seriously and imagined 
that he incarnated the Revolution. 

But to whom, let us ask once more, did he owe this 
credit which his personal value in no way justified? Was 
not some ambitious and powerful person pushing him for- 
ward, in order to study and make him a docile instrument, 
this supernumerary who was sufficiently rigid to be in- 
corruptible and at the same time sufficiently supple to 
obey blindly the one who commanded him as a master in 
the name of his duties as an ultra-republican? Unsup- 
ported by any text, Marat has been named among Si- 
mon's protectors, but one cannot see the tie between this 
cobbler of mean capacity and the theorist of anarchy. 
Robespierre, whose name has also been advanced hypo- 
thetically, also appears to be wholly unconnected with 
Simon's rapid advancement. As we must, however, dis- 
cover the impresario, is there not ground for believing 
that Chaumette and Hebert, cunning and enterprising 
accomplices who were absolute masters at the Temple 
and over the Commune, held the strings of this puppet for 
whom they reserved a star part, playing unconsciously 
the perilous scenes whilst they themselves prudently re- 
mained in the side-scenes? This supposition has at least 
the advantage over the preceding ones of a reference : the 
municipal representative Verdier — who in his capacity as 
a doctor surpassed in penetration the great majority of 
his colleagues of the General Council, and who, having 
been entrusted with the auditing of the Temple accounts, 
was in a position to see well and know the prison staff 
wrote: — "One of the deputies of the Commune, Hebert, 
wished to make Simon the instrument of his villainies by 
the praise which he incessantly bestowed upon him and 
which convinced him that he was the foremost of patriots." 
As to Chaumette, one can easily see the reasons for his 
influence over this stupid inferior. They lived almost 
door to door and frequently met at the meeting-place of 

89 



THE DAUPHIN 

their section ; both had been elected at the Hotel de Ville 
as commissioners on August 10th; and there can be no 
doubt that Simon conceived there a deep admiration 
for this eminent confederate, who in a few hours had 
become the applauded tenor of the Commune and with 
whom he took pride in rubbing shoulders. Another cir- 
cumstance also united them. Chaumette was the son of 
a provincial shoemaker, and though formerly he would 
have shown great shame in this descent, he prided him- 
self upon it openly now that the general outlook was 
democratic. He had read in Jean Jacques that Emile 
^'honoured a shoemaker much more than an emperor" 
and knew that the philosopher of Geneva preferred to see 
his pupil "a cobbler rather than a poet" — all of them 
quotations which delighted Simon, more used, in his life 
of disappointments, to blows than flattery. If it is 
clear then that the poor man professed a veneration for 
Chaumette, the latter, in return, ruled over him entirely, 
and the account of certain incidents which follow con- 
firm this indisputably. 

After the King's death, the supervision of his widow, 
sister and two orphans was perceptibly slackened.^ On 
January 26th one of the commissioners on duty, Toulan, 
dared to compromise himself to the extent of bringing the 
Queen newspapers relating the execution of Louis XVI. 
Toulan had the reputation of being an ardent revolu- 
tionary. A native of Toulouse, established in 1787 as a 
bookseller and music-dealer in the Tuileries quarter, he 
had rapidly acquired a sort of popularity; president of 
the district, of the Louvre, then a member of the Com- 
mune of August 10th, he became, in 1793, at the age of 
32, somewhat of a personage. Medium in stature, with 
a round face, broad forehead and slightly snub nose,^ he 

^"We had a little more liberty; the guards thought we were going 
to be sent away." Madame Roy ale. 

"Description, passports. National Archives, W 400, file 927. Quoted 
by Leon Lecestre. Les tentatives d'^vasion de Marie Antoinette am 

90 



PLOTS 

spoke with communicative facility and animation, and 
the whole of his person was seductive. His frequent visits 
to the Temple had furnished him with numerous occasions 
for approaching the prisoners. Like many others he 
showed himself indifferent to their misfortune and this 
unpitying attitude merited him the full confidence of the 
General Council ; but a remark made by Marie Antoinette 
proves that Toulan from the very first had assumed 
this austere mask with the direct purpose of hiding his re- 
spectful pity.-"^ The Temple drama abounds in strata- 
gems of that nature ; it is that fact which makes it so 
complex and at times so obscure, with the result that His- 
tory, on many points, is deceived as was the Commune. 
This southerner was so adroit and so clever a comedian, 
he affected in his colleagues' presence a jargon so purely 
revolutionary that he led away the most suspicious. He 
filled them, too with respect, for he possessed both wit 
and self-possession, — especially the latter, as he proved 
at the time (January 26-27) it was his turn to be on 
guard by forcing open, in the Council room, the drawer 
of the cupboard where, five days before, the sealed packet 
containing the King's wedding-ring, his signet and the 
hair of the Queen and his children had been deposited. 
Toulan took possession of these relics and handed them 
to the Queen. When the Temple Council, in a flutter, per- 
ceived the disappearance of the precious objects, it came 
to the conclusion that their commercial value had tempted 
some common thief, — an opinion which, without the slight- 
est doubt, was strengthened by Toulan himself, and it was 
agreed that "the affair be hushed up."" 

Temple et A le Conciergerie. Extract from the Revue des questions 
historiques, April, 1886. 

^ "He has not varied for five months," wrote Marie Antoinette in 
February, 1793, to M. de Jarjayes. Five months go back to the 
middle of September, 1793, and it was indeed on September 19th 
that Toulan figures for the first time among the commissioners on 
Guard. Lecestre, p. 9 and note. 

^Madame Royale. "They perceived, in the municipal representa- 
tives' room, that the sealed packet containing my father's signet, 
his ring and several other things had been opened. The seal was 

91 



THE DAUPHIN 

In all probability it was also due to Toulan's influence 
that the Queen received the visit of a seamstress who came 
to alter the mourning dresses which, through not having 
been tried on, fitted badly. This worker, Mile, Pion, 
was no other than one of the Queen's former dressmakers^ 
who had entered the service of Mme. de Tourzel. She 
came to the prison on two days in succession. "I cannot 
express," she related, "all I felt on seeing what a ray of 
consolation was brought into the faces of this august 
family by my puny person . . . Mgr. the Dauphin, whose 
age excused his thoughtlessness, ran sometimes to me, 
then to the Queen, to the princesses and even to the munici- 
pal officers. He took advantage of this to put to me, 
under the appearance of a game, all the questions the 
royal family might desire, and he played his part so well 
that no one would have imagined he had spoken to me."^ 
It is about the same period, perhaps, that one must place 
the visits of the painter Kocharsky, who drew a pastel 
portrait of Marie Antoinette with her head covered by a 
widow's veil.^ Precious incidents to be noted. However 
severe the regulations made by the Commune might be, 
they succeeded in eluding them ; the Temple was not so 
stout a prison that they could not hope to enter it. The 

broken and the signet missing. The municipal representatives were 
disquieted, but in the end they thought it was a thief who had 
taken the signet on account of the gold. The person who had taken 
it was well intentioned; he was not a thief." 

^ Mile. Pion had already worked for the Queen in August and 
September 1793. National Archives, F*, 1311. 

^ Memoir es de Tourzel, Vol. II, p. 306. 

^Bulletin du Tribunal revolutionnuire, 2nd series, No. 30, p. 117. 
"Continuation of the examination of Marie Antoinette of Austria, 
former Queen of France. — Q. Have you not been painted since 
your detention? — R. Yes, in pastel. — Q. Have you not been closeted 
with the painter and did you not use this pretext to receive news? — 
R. No. — Q. What is the painter's name? — R, Coestier, a Polish 
painter, established for more than twenty years past in Paris. — 
Q. Where does he live?— R. Rue du Coq-Saint-Honor6." The 
Queen evidently pronounced Kocharsky's name in the Czeck fashion, — 
Koersked, and the stenographer of the Bulletin gallicised it. This 
picture by Kocharsky or Kucharsky figured in 1894 at the Marie 
Antoinette et son temps exhibition. It then belonged to Vicomte 
d'Hunolstein. 

92 



PLOTS 

Queen also succeeded in getting Dr. Brunyer, the former 
doctor to the children of the King of France, to attend 
Madam Royale who was suffering from a sore on the leg ; 
and as treatment lasted for more than a month the doctor 
was able to keep the prisoners well supplied with news and 
to communicate information transmitted to him by Mme. 
de Tourzel, then staying in Paris. The suspicious zeal of 
the commissioners was visibly on the decline. 

Moreover, at this same period we note a singular re- 
missness on the part of the Commune. In spite of its 
good cooking, the Temple seems to have had no further 
attraction for the municipal representatives. At the 
sitting of the General Council on January 28th a mem- 
ber, acting as spokesman for his colleagues, protested that 
it was ridiculous to see the representatives of the people 
of Paris acting "as valets to Madam Capet and emptying' 
her chamber-pots.'* Despite the murmurs with which this 
oratorical effort was received, the speaker continued as 
follows : "It is time the Commune was relieved of this 
load; it is time our responsibility ended. Let the ex- 
Queen be put in the Conciergerie or at La Force !" The 
proposal raised a long debate in which Real, one of 
Chaumette's deputies, took part and concluded with a 
few phrases full of threatening anticipations : "It is not 
on account of Capet's wife that you go to the Temple but 
because of her son. Do you think the guard you are keep- 
ing is useless.'* . . . Personally, I believe it is more im- 
portant than ever. Louis was hardly to be feared any 
more, but do you count his son — that interesting child 
who is still supported by an ancient prejudice — as noth- 
ing? Believe me he is a hostage who must be carefully re- 
tained. Have a fear that in feigning to attach little im- 
portance to his custody you are not suspected of attaching 
little to his escape." ^ But the ardour of the municipal rep- 
resentatives was in no way stimulated. A week later Dorat- 

^General Council of the Commune. Courrier franqais, January 
28th, 1793. 

93 



THE DAUPHIN 

Cubieres, secretary of the Commune, remarked with melan- 
choly on the small number of persons present on the 
Council; he bitterly complained of his brothers' negli- 
gence "and of their coldness in serving the common- 
wealth." ^ General Santerre himself was of the opinion 
that the military guard of the Temple should be re- 
duced. Instead of three hundred men, a commander and 
a standard-bearer, he proposed to mobilize daily no more 
than a hundred national guards commanded by an adju- 
tant and a sergeant. The proposition was about to be 
voted when Real, who seemed to be well informed, declared 
that "never ought vigilance to be more active" and the 
General's demand was referred to the office of the public 
prosecutor.^ The Parisian militia showed so little alacrity 
in this duty that, two months later, it was necessary to 
consider the means of paying three livres a day to those 
citizens who would consent to occupy the guard-houses at 
the Temple or to feed them there at the Nation's ex- 
pense.^ The unconcern on the subject of the royal prison, 
the desertion of members of the Council soon became so 
general that on a certain evening, at the ordinary hour 
for the sitting, the mayor found himself "almost alone" 
to receive a petition from the workmen of Paris.* 

Real, however, was well informed. Since the doors of 
the Temple had been closed on the royal family never had 
its faithful adherents worked with more activity for its 
deliverance. Plots to abduct the prisoners were hatched 
in Paris, in the provinces, in the army and abroad, and 
although several, which doubtless never got beyond being 
mere plans, — nay even dreams, — have become known to 

^ General Council of the Commune. Courrtfir franqais, February 
Sth, 1793. 

- General Council of the Commune, sitting of February 12th. 
Courrier franqais, 14th. 

' General Council of the Commune, sitting of April 12th. Courrier 
franqais, 13th. 

* General Council of the Commune, sitting of September Sth. 
Courrier franqais, of the Sth. 

94< 



PLOTS 

us only through very vague indications/ those which took 
form remained sufficiently numerous to permit one to note 
that an escape, even collective, was not considered to be 
unfeasible by those who were in the best position to 
reckon the risks and eventual mishaps. That a French 
emigre, Comte Louis de Noailles, should have conceived 
the scheme of travelling from London to Paris in order 
to snatch the Dauphin from his jailors without any other 
means of action than a forged passport and two air- 
pistols ^ proves more in favour of his determination than 
his judgment. But others, much better informed, hardly 
showed more circumspection. Dumouriez who, from his 
headquarters in Flanders, ordered the Marquis de Frege- 
ville, colonel of hussars of Chamborant, Montjoye, adju- 
tant general, and Nordmann, colonel of hussars of 
Berchiny, to move on Paris with three hundred of their 
surest and bravest men. These officers, bearers of a 
despatch for the minister, which would have served as a 
pretext for their mission in case they were obliged to jus- 
tify it, "were to push on as far as the forest of Bondy, 
hide there, enter Paris by the Boulevard du Temple, break 
through the prison guard whilst giving several false 
alarms at various points, carry off the four prisoners 
riding behind, and bring them at full speed to Pont-Sainte- 
Maxence, where another cavalry corps would be there 
to receive them." The enterprise was a bold one, but it 
presented chances of success. It is certain that a squad- 
ron of hussars, barring the streets and forcing the doors 
of the Temple, would have had the upper hand, after a 
few blows with the flat of their sabres, over the peaceful 
national guards who were playing at bowls or quoits in 
the prison garden and the commissioners at table in the 
council room.^ 

* See among others, Correspondance du comte de Mercy-Argenteau, 
February 6th, 1793. 

^The date of Louis de Noailles' plan was the end of January, 1793. 

^ See Memoires de Dumouriez, IV, pp. 147 and 148, and Lettres de 
1793, 1st series, by Arthur Chuquet, pp. 104 to 112. 

95 



THE DAUPHIN 

The less expeditious attempt perpetrated by certain 
municipal representatives merits more attention. These 
men, at least, knew by long experience the chances of 
success as well as the risks they were going to face. We 
have not, perhaps, forgotten Toulan, that young Gascon 
who, on duty at the Temple on January 26th and 27th, 
did not fear to abstract the objects left by Louis XVI 
when leaving for the scaffold and hand them to the Queen 
clandestinely. Either because this audacious act showed 
him what could be done thanks to the ineptitude or in- 
dolence of his colleagues, or because, most ardent re- 
publican though he was, he had been touched by the mis- 
fortunes of the captive Queen, he submitted to her, on 
the same day, a plan of escape which she consented to 
examine on the sole condition that one of her faithful 
supporters, who had remained in secret correspondence 
with her since the beginning of her captivity, was made 
acquainted with it and gave his approbation. This de- 
voted royalist was M. de Jarjayes.^ Having received 
from the King a formal order not to leave Paris, he had 
undertaken several delicate and dangerous missions. He 
was, moreover, still in office and an employe, in the 
capacity of his rank at the archives of the War de- 
partment.^ 

Toulan did not hesitate. Calling on Jar j ayes, he asked 
to converse with him secretly.^ His dress, manners, 
everything proclaimed him a revolutionary, and great 
was the royalist's surprise when he heard his visitor an- 
nounce that he was a member of the odious regicide Com- 

^Fran9ois Augustin Regnier de Jar j ayes (the name was pro- 
nounced Jarjaille), born at Lepaix, in I)a?uphiny, October 4th, 1745, 
major-general, March 22nd, 1792. Archives of the Ministry of War. 

^Archives of the Ministry of War and Precis des tentatives qui one 
4t6 faites four arracher la Reine a la captivity du Temple at the 
end of the M^moire de M. le baron de Ooguelat, lieutenant-giniral. 
Paris. Baudouin, 1823. 

'According to Goguelat, this was on February 2nd, 1793; on the 5th, 
according to the note sent by Jarjayes to the Emperor of Austria. 
See Comte de Pimodan's Le complot Toulan, Jarjayes et Lepitre, 
d'apris tin document inedit. 

96 



PLOTS 

mune and saw him on his knees "bearing witness to a 
deep repentance of his former conduct and begging for 
entire confidence." As a proof of his sincerity, Toulan 
handed General de Jar j ayes a letter from the Queen, 
guaranteeing his devotion. He did not set forth his plan 
of escape at this first interview, but contented himself 
with indicating that, to bring it to realisation, the com- 
plicity of one of his colleagues who shared his duties at 
the Temple was indispensable. This colleague was the 
municipal representative Lepitre, who consented to com- 
promise himself. But as he was at the head of a pros- 
perous school in the Faubourg Saint Jacques he demanded 
a large indemnity — two hundred thousand francs, of 
which half was to be paid in advance — to compensate him 
for the eventual loss of his position. Jar j ayes wrote 
to the Queen, assuring her of his absolute devotion. 
Toulan, who as a member of the finance commission could 
enter the Temple when he pleased, undertook to hand her 
the letter, and a few days later he took back her reply 
to the general. She begged Jar j ayes to receive "the 
new person" — Lepitre ; "his appearance is not prepossess- 
ing, but he is absolutely necessary and we must have him." 
Marie Antoinette added that, as regards the sum to be 
paid, it was advisable to apply to M. de Laborde,^ who 
had money of hers. 

Lepitre, indeed, was not all outside show. Twenty- 
nine years old, he was short of stature, stout and lame.^ 
If his assistance appeared indispensable, that is because, 
still at that time, six commissioners, half of them re- 
lieved every other day, mounted guard at the Temple con- 
tinually. Every evening the three newcomers mixed three 
folded pieces of paper in a hat, two bearing the word 
Nuit, the third the word Jour. The municipal repre- 
sentative who drew the latter slept quietly until morn- 
ing in one of the beds in the Council room, whilst the 

^Marquis Joseph de Laborde, a wealthy financier, then retired to 
M^reville, Seine-et-Oise. 
^'Lepitre. Quelques souvenirs. 

97 



THE DAUPHIN 

two others whom chance had chosen for night duty 
ascended to the prisoners' anteroom and installed them- 
selves on the folding beds. Now, Toulan had found a 
means of correcting this drawing of lots. He wrote the 
word Jour on all the three pieces of paper, offered the 
hat to one of his colleagues and when he had unfolded 
his paper and read the word which let him off night duty 
the two others threw their papers into the fire without 
opening them. The success of this ingenious stratagem 
remained, it is true, subordinate to the choice made by 
the General Council of the Temple commissioners, but, as 
we have seen, the municipal representatives were deserting 
the Hotel de Ville. Consequent on their small number, 
this choice had become so difficult that "during several 
months they ceased to draw lots for them ;" ^ those who 
offered themselves were appointed, and Toulan and Lepi- 
tre often offered their services. The third colleague added 
to their number hardly troubled them since they had 
found a means of getting rid of him for the whole night. 
It was thus they succeeded, thanks to the Gascon's cun- 
ning, in spending long hours with the prisoners and in 
conversing with them, without fear of troublesome per- 
sons, when the Tisons, whom they distrusted, had gone 
to sleep. 

Toulan did still better: he succeeded in getting General 
de Jarjayes into the Temple. How was he disguised.? 
No one has ever discovered. But of the fact we can have 
no doubt, since we possess the confession of Jarjayes him- 
self " and two of the Queen's letters allude to the visit.^ 

^Lepltre, p. 33. 

^"Introduced in disguise into the Temple, I assured myself first 
of all. . . ." Note from Jarjayes to the Emperor of Austria. Imperial 
and royal archives of Vienna. Varia France, fascicle 67. This im- 
portant document was discovered and brought to light by the Comte 
de Pimodan. Le complot de Toulan, loc. cit. 

^"If you are determined to come here, it would be better if it were 
soon; but, mon Dieu, take great care not to be recognised especially 
by the woman (Tison) who is shut in with us here. . . ." — "I fully 
recognise your attachment in all you said to me here. . . ." 

98 



PLOTS 

Without having recourse to Laborde, the General had 
paid one hundred thousand francs to Lepitre out of his 
own pocket ; but he wished to understand the possibilities 
of the projected escape. After examination, he recog- 
nised that if the escape of the whole of the royal family 
was "chimerical," that of the Queen alone appeared "very 
practicable," the commissioners, he writes, "being able to 
get her away without any danger, under the same dis- 
guise they arranged for my own introduction. . . ." We 
know that Marie Antoinette refused to leave her son 
and daughter, and Jar j ayes, who, appointed to the Army 
of the Alps, could not postpone his departure from Paris, 
in vain implored her to allow herself to be convinced. 
He had to be content with taking away from the Temple 
the signet and ring of Louis XVI which he sent to the 
Comte de Provence with a letter from the Queen and 
Madam Elizabeth and a short note bearing the signature 
of Madame Royale and the Dauphin.^ 

Short was their illusion. Conceived toward the end 
of February, the project was abandoned at the beginning 

^Toulan's plan was revealed later by Lepitre. The Queen and 
Madam Elizabeth were to have been disguised as commissioners of 
the Commune by means of great coats, hats, cockades and scarves 
brought in by Toulan and Lepitre under their cloaks. They would 
also have supplied them with cards similar to those used by the 
municipal representatives. The two children, disguised as little 
lamp-lighters, with their carmagnoles stained with oil, hands and 
faces blackened, would have impersonated the two assistants whom 
the "illuminateur" of the Temple brought with him daily to assist in 
his work of cleaning. Tison and his wife were to have been put to 
sleep by means of tobacco containing a narcotic. The Temple guard 
was not to be feared. "It sufficed to show one's card at a distance 
for the sentinels not to disturb themselves." Half past seven was 
to be the hour of departure. They would have gone as far as the 
Rue de la Corderie, quite near to the prison; three cabriolets would 
have received the fugitives, as well as Toulan and Lepitre, and 
at full speed would have travelled along the road to Normandy. As 
the stages had been foreseen, they would have been far from Paris 
when the prison guard discovered the abduction, for it would not 
have been until nine at night, supper time, that the prisoners' absence 
would have been noticed. The time to hasten to the Commune, to 
the police, to the mayor's, to organise the pursuit, the whole night 
perhaps lost in proceedings and discussions, would have assured the 
possibility of embarking at Dieppe without having been tracked." 

99 



THE DAUPHIN 

of March.^ But already another attempt at abduction 
was being prepared. Was the royal family made aware 
of it? Possibly so, for Turgy's devotion was such that 
he was not to be discouraged and, in default of obliging 
commissioners, he kept up a continuous correspondence 
with the outside world. It seems clear, however, that the 
new conspirators this time did without the Queen's assent. 
At their head was Baron de Batz, well-known for his 
counter-revolutionary ardour and enterprises. He had 
recruited a whole company, consisting of thirty enter- 
prising royalists under the command of a grocer named 
Cortey,^ a captain in the national guards. This com- 
pany was to occupy the doors of the Temple one evening 
when the municipal representative Michonis, associated 
in the plot, was commissioner in the Tower. He undertook 
to open the doors and warn the prisoners who, covered 
with military cloaks and hats and armed with a gun, 
would have left about midnight as a false patrol.^ The 
two children, well surrounded by soldiers, were to pass 
unperceived. Outside a number of faithful followers, 
stationed here and there, were to receive the fugitives 
and, without losing an instant, conduct them to an 
isolated house in the neighbourhood of Brie-Comte- 
Robert, where they were to remain in hiding.* To eifect 
that short journey the whole night lay before them, for 

^In the Jarjayes file in the Archives de la guerre is the following 
note: — "March 2nd, 1793, left France entrusted with a confidential 
mission to Monsieur on behalf of the august prisoners of the Temple." 
The Comte de Pimodan challenges this date of March 2nd and 
believes it is a slip of the pen; according to him it ought to be 
May 2nd. The former date, however, appears to agree absolutely 
with what happened at the Commune, for it was on March 26th 
that a member made the first allusion to Lepitre and Toulan's at- 
tentions toward the prisoners. General Council of the Commune. 
Courrier franqais, March 28th, p. 228. 

^Joseph-Victor Cortey, grocer of the Rue de la Loi, formerly 
Richelieu, an influential member of the Lepeletier section. 

'"'The big door always opened for the patrols commanded by Cortey 
around the Temple during the night." — Senar. 

■•Baron Hyde de Neuville was among these royalists posted in the 
neighbourhood of the Temple, awaiting the Queen and her children. 
He describes that night of anguish in his Memoires. 

100 



PLOTS 

the Temple Council could not take alarm until morning 
when they failed to see the Queen leave her room as usual 
to wish her sister-in-law good-morning. 

Such a combination may seem very hazardous; to judge 
whether it was acceptable one must know what that 
armed force was which held the military posts at the 
Temple. The national guard of 1793 was no longer the 
citizen militia of the early days of the Revolution. 
Santerre and the Commune had collaborated in its dis- 
organisation and its lack of discipline. Hebert, as pow- 
erful at the General Council as was Chaumette himself, 
had, for his part, declared merciless war on the grena- 
diers. Doubtless the shortness of his stature justified 
his ferocious hati-ed against those fine men — the honour 
and ornament of the Parisian cohorts. One night, at 
the Commune, he gave full rein to his rancour, making 
a hostile attack against these favourites "who had no 
other merit over their fellow-citizens than their height" 
and who benefited by "those hateful distinctions imagined 
by the traitor La Fayette to oppress patriots and pre- 
vent the birth of equality!" Seized with sudden fury, 
he demanded that a grenadier sentinel, "placed at the 
door of the room in which the Commune sat, should be 
discharged there and then." In conformity with this 
speech of a public prosecutor, the sentry was dismissed, 
the companies of grenadiers were disbanded, and the few 
municipal representatives who sat that night, vying 
with each other in complaisance and servility toward 
Chaumette*s deputy, decided to request the national 
guards to abandon their uniform, "another distinction 
destructive of Equality," ^ One may judge what the 
zeal and cohesion of troops enrolled in the service of 
such talkers was like. There were reports, in various 
localities of the suburbs of Paris, of bands of national 
guards who, led by municipal officers furnished with 

^General Council of the Commune. Sitting of March 1st, 1793. 
Courrier franqais of the 2nd. 

101 



THE DAUPHIN 

their scarves and decorated with the national cockade, 
broke into farms, bound the masters and servants hand 
and foot, threw them into the cellars and plundered 
the houses.-^ For the honour of the Commune it was 
established that these malefactors were no other than 
army deserters disguised as citizen-soldiers ; but the 
reputation of the national guard was not improved 
thereby. Disorder therein was the rule. It happened 
that men attached to half-companies presented themselves 
at the Temple five to seven hours after the regulation 
hour of noon, without orders to mount guard, without 
convocation, without entrance cards, so that it was 
necessary to open an inquiry in order to discover whether 
these militiamen were "evil-intentioned," seeking to ab- 
duct the prisoners, or good citizens anxious to accom- 
plish their duty.^ One can imagine then what this 
"fonnidable" garrison of the Temple, composed of three 
hundred men scattered in the guard-houses and annexes 
of the prison, was like ; to enter or leave the enclosure 
it was sufficient "to show one's card at a distance to 
the indolent sentinels who did not disturb themselves to 
examine it," ^ and one can understand that an adven- 
turous man like de Batz did not hesitate to strive in 
craftiness and especially in zealousness against these 
heedless soldiers. 

However, he failed in his enterprise. But not through 
want of study and precautions, for, according to a 
manuscript note left by Senar, one of the spies of the 
Committees of the Convention, the daring baron came to 
study the localities for himself. On the night fixed upon, 
Michonis was at his post in the Queen's anteroom; Cap- 
tain Cortey and his thirty royalists occupied the guard- 

* Incidents of this nature occurred at Suresnes, Montesson, Fert6- 
sous-Jouarre and elsewhere. — Courrier frangais of April 21st and 
23rd, 1792. 

- General Council of the Commune. Sitting of August 29th, 1793. 
Courrier frangais of September 2nd. 

* Lepitre. 

102 



PLOTS 

room of the Tower; de Batz had enrolled himself with 
them, wishing to share the dangers to which he was ex- 
posing his companions ; whilst the commissioners were 
asleep in the Council room, the soldiers in the outbuild- 
ings of the Palace. Everything was exactly as they could 
wish; and Cortey was about to put his men in move- 
ment when, suddenly, the shoemaker Simon arrived, run- 
ning toward him. He came from the Commune which 
was then sitting. "Ah ! there you are," he said to Cortey ; 
"if I'd not seen you here I should not have felt easy." 
Thereupon he had the prisoners* room opened and noted 
their presence.. He then communicated to Michonis an 
order from the General Council to proceed to the Hotel 
de Ville at once. Michonis obeyed. Simon replaced him 
and gave the alarm; whilst Cortey, under the pretext of 
providing for the security of the precincts of the Temple, 
led his patrol into the street in order to permit de Batz 
to escape. The affair had no sequel, — and that is very 
singular. On arriving at the Commune, Michonis replied 
with such self-possession and good-nature to the ques- 
tions put to him that he dispelled all suspicions. On the 
following day, when Simon came in his turn to state 
that, warned by an annonymous leter thus worded 
"Michonis will betray to-night. Be vigilant!" he had 
thought fit to claim the honour of saving the Republic 
once more, all his colleagues were convinced that a wag 
had made game of him and amused himself by hoaxing 
the simpleton.^ 

But they were deceived; for if the Commune was not 
better informed it is because someone did not wish it. 
It seems that it was forbidden to consider an attempt 
to abduct the young King as at all possible and that a 
mysterious protector — the same who pushed the naive 

'Concerning the circumstances of de Batz's attempt, as well as 
that of Toulan, Jar j ayes and Lepltre, see the study, strongly sup- 
ported by documentary evidence, by M. G. Lecestre: Les tentatives 
d'ivasion de Marie Antoinette au Temple et a la Conciergerie. Ex- 
tracted from the Revue des questions historiques, April, 1886, 

103 



THE DAUPHIN 

Simon to the front of the stage on every occasion — ac- 
corded, through a sort of jealous prudence, impunity of 
silence to whomsoever attempted that chance. There was 
the same tacit neutrality when Toulan and Lepitre were 
denounced on March 26th at the Commune by a member 
who declared they had had frequent conversations with 
the Queen and Madam Elizabeth. The drunken tailor 
Lechenard supported the accusation. Lepitre was "a 
false brother on whom the prisoners lavished politeness 
and amiability"; whilst Toulan strove his hardest to 
amuse them "with pleasantries which degraded the dig- 
nity of a magistrate of the people." Toulan and Lepitre 
were present at the sitting. The latter contented him- 
self with denying the alleged facts ; the former got out of 
the difficulty so well, in his habitual facetious manner ^ 
that the denunciation had no sequel. Hardly a fort- 
night later Lepitre and Toulan again dared to offer 
their services as guardians at the prison ! 

But on April 15th the girl Tison, having come to the 
Temple to embrace her parents, was searched by the 
commissioners and among "various things" found on her 
was a piece of dimity marked with suspicious characters.^ 
The municipal representatives prevented her entering 
the Tower, much to the rage of the Tisons who were 
passionately fond of their Pierrette. Tison pere flew into 
a passion and created such an uproar that the com- 
missioners requested him to descend to the Council. Pache, 
the mayor of Paris, happened to be there, so Tison ad- 

^ Toulan possessed the art of winning his colleagues over. One day 
at the Commune he called the municipal deputies "little representa- 
tives" — a disdainful description which drew forth shouts of "Down 
with him ! Down with him !" The uproar was so great that the 
president had to put on his hat. At this point Toulan descended 
from his seat, advanced toward the president's desk, removed his 
scarf, brought it to his lips and then laid it on the table. This the- 
atrical act transformed the hooting into frantic cheering. . . . — Cour- 
rier franqais, November 25th, 1792. 

^ General Council of the Commune, sitting of April 13th, 1793. 
Courrier franqais of the 15th. 

104 



PLOTS 

dressed him. "What! forbid him to see his own child? 
And yet they allowed the prisoners to be approached by 
certain not over trustworthy persons through whose 
intermediary they corresponded with the outside world!" 
Pache questioned the man. Whereupon Tison, certain "a 
plot" was on foot, related everything. One night, at 
supper-time, the widow Capet, on taking out her pocket- 
handkerchief, let a pencil fall from her pocket, whilst in 
Elizabeth's room, on prying about, he had discovered 
some wafers and sealing wax for closing letters. Tison 
mere, knowing her husband to be at words with the mayor, 
also came down in a state of great emotion and ran off 
all she knew. The municipal representatives whom she 
suspected were Toulan, Lepitre and still some others ; also 
the waiter Turgy. . . . Shouting and lamenting she de- 
manded her daughter. She and her husband signed their 
declaration. 

The affair came before the Commune on the 21st and 
produced a great sensation. It looked as though with- 
out a doubt, Lepitre and Toulan were lost. The most sum- 
mary enquiry would reveal the fact that the former had 
sold himself for one hundred thousand francs to the 
enemies of the republic, that the latter had introduced a 
royalist agent into the Temple. Prevarication on the 
part of both was manifest. The revolutionary Tribunal 
which had been sitting for the past fortnight had been 
formed to punish crimes of that character. . . . But 
nothing of the sort happened. They were content with 
ordering that seals be placed on the papers of the in- 
criminated commissioners, and as nothing suspicious was 
found in the documents they were not even struck off 
the list of members of the Commune ! Only the prisoners 
were punished. A minute search in their apartments led 
to the seizure of their prayer-books, a copy of the Con~ 
secration de la France au Sacre-Caeur de Jesus, and a 
man's hat found in Madame Elizabeth's bedroom and 

105 



THE DAUPHIN 

which she said was a souvenir of her brother.^ Astounded, 
much more than the others, by this incomprehensible in- 
dulgence, Lepitre succeeded later in explaining it by the 
rivalry which then began to set the Commune and the 
Convention by the ears. The latter felt only disdain for 
the "little representatives" of the Hotel de Ville, com- 
monly called "scavengers," "blood-drinkers," "Septem- 
ber slaughterers" ^ by the moderate deputies, middle- 
class citizens disdainful of these common people. On the 
other hand, the Commune would not suffer the slightest 
offence to its prestige and, in order to preserve it from 
cracks, hid the imperfections of its members as best it 
could. That is what, for a time, saved so many suspicious 
or untrustworthy municipal representatives ; "that is 
why Toulan, against whom there were such strong charges 
that it was difficult to absolve him, was allowed to 
escape." ^ 

^General Council of the Commune, sittings of April 22nd and 23rd 
and May 1st. Courrier franqais of April 23rd and 25th and May 
2nd. The discovery of this hat was the occasion for long discussions. 
The point in question was whether it had really belonged to Louis 
XVI or had been brought to the Temple as part of a disguise for 
one of the prisoners. The hatter Dulong, purveyor to the King, 
was questioned. They examined even the executioner, who declared 
that the hat of the condemned man had been torn in pieces by the 
crowd, and divided amongst them. 

^Manuel's report to the General Council of the Commune. — Courrier 
franqais, April 23rd, 1793. 

^Lepitre. Quelques souvenirs ... p. 70. At the time of the 
Queen's trial, Lepitre and Toulan were, indeed, arrested; but the 
latter escaped from the hands of the police by means of a theatrical 
trick which one can hardly believe deceived them. Captured much 
later, Toulan — like Michonis— died on the scaffold; but that was 
a little before the 9th of Thermidor after the disappearance of 
Chaumette who had been opposed to drawing the attention of the 
government and the public to the Temple. To linish with the Lepttre 
and Toulan incident, one must add that the latter, having declared 
that he risked his head through devotion and not, like his colleague, 
in the hope of pecuniary reward, received, however, from the Queen 
a gold box containing 24,000 livres which she forced him to accept. 
(See Pimodan, loc. cit.) Fouquier-Tinville discovered and divulged 
in his speech for the prosecution that Toulan, at the time of Capet's 
execution, found a means of getting possession of the condemned 
man's hat and substituting his own, — a stratagem which enabled him 
to oflFer the King's head-covering to Madame Elizabeth (see Lecestre, 
loc. cit). 

106 



PLOTS 

The history of the captivity and misfortunes of the 
son of Louis XVI would be incomplete and obscure if 
we isolated it from ambient politics by neglecting- to 
study the underhand intrigues created by his royal in- 
vestiture. Certainly we do not know all of them. They 
were unknown to the majority of contemporaries; but 
time has brought some of them to light. First of all we 
must lay down as a principle that we still know hardly any- 
thing of what went on behind the scenes during the Revolu- 
tion; those who communicate the knowledge of it to us 
have too often reduced it to the narrow measure of our 
prejudices or of their partiality; it was very different 
from that which they show us, and if a Robespierre, a 
Barras or a Fouche were by a miracle to return and 
describe it to us without either reticence or omission, 
their narrative would apear absurd to the official pro- 
fessors who have made a point of instructing us. Now, 
"nothing, a priori, is absurd in this terrible history of 
the Terror, so mysterious in so many ways," writes a 
Well-informed scholar who has not the reputation of 
pleasing the romantic.-^ By applying this wise precept 
to the captivity of the Dauphin, we shall recognise per- 
haps that it was not a simple episode of the great revolu- 
tionary drama but that it formed the basis and texture of 
it, unknown even to those to whom the parts were dis- 
tributed. 

On April 6th, 1793, the Convention decreed the crea- 
tion of a Committee of nine members intrusted to con- 
centrate all the powers and to give impetus to the 
executive Council. The matter had not been voted with- 
out oppositions and one of the most prophetic was that 
of Biroteau who said: "Is it not permissible for a friend 
of liberty to fear that there may arise in this Committee 
an ambitious man who, under the mark of patriotism, 

^Albert Mathiez, professor of modern history at the Faculty of 
Letters of Besanqon, Etudes robespierrists : la Conspiration de 
I'Etrcmger, p. 90. 

107 



THE DAUPHIN 

will usurp the supreme power?" ^ The constitutive de- 
cree ordered that the deliberations of the new Committee 
should be secret and set down in registers.^ The nine ^ 
met on the following day, Sunday, April 7th. They de- 
cided to hold two sittings a day, at nine in the morning 
and seven at night, and "not to admit any citizen during 
their discussions." ^ Thus the Committee of Public 
Safety came into existence. By what miracle was there 
found a man sufficiently audacious and sufficiently artful 
to brave this interdiction and worm himself in habitually 
present at the conversations of the redoubtable Commis- 
sioners.? Among many other enigmas, that is one of the 
most disconcerting and most discussed. 

When, some twenty-five years ago, the papers of Lord 
Grenville, preserved in the archives of Dropmore Lodge, 
were published in England under the direction of Mr. 
J. J. Cartwright, secretary of the Historical Manu- 
scripts Commission, students of the liistory of the French 
Revolution were astounded to learn that Francis Drake, 
British Minister at Genoa during the Terror, sent to Lord 
Grenville, then head of the Foreign Office, the reports of 
a secret agent he kept in Paris and in which the men and 
events of the Revolution were presented under an aspect 
which appeared to be absolutely fanciful. 

As Francis Drake, in the course of his diplomatic 
career, was subjected to rude trials by our jacobins who 
occasionally made game of him audaciously, one was at 
liberty to believe that, once more a victim of his anti- 
revolutionary zeal, he had been grossly hoaxed. Such 
was the opinion of the most reputable specialists.^ What ! 
there had slipped in among the secretaries of the Com- 
mittee of Public Safety a spy, admitted to the most 

^ Moniteur, reprint, XVI, p. 76. 

^Decree of April 6th, 1793. 

' Guyton-Morveau, president, Br6ard, vice-president, Lindet and 
Barf^re, secretaries, Danton, Delacroix, Cambon, Delmas and 
Treilhard. 

* National Archives, A Pn 180, 191, 33A. 

* See Revolution frangais, XXXI, p. 378, and XXXII, p. 121 et seq. 

108 



PLOTS 

secret and most compromising deliberations? Improba- 
bility number one. And it happened, in addition, that 
this spy, who remained anonymous, had communicated to 
the person who paid him information which was in com- 
plete disagreement with what we know of that memorable 
period ! For instance, he represented the Committee of 
Public Safety as divided into two enemy camps, one of 
which held its sittings outside the Tuileries, the official 
headquarters, and hatched its plots at Choisy, Charenton, 
Vanves, Issy and elsewhere. . . . Among the personages 
taking part in these clandestine meetings he mentioned 
such men as Hebert, Pache, Chaumette and others who, 
not being members of the Convention, never formed part 
of the Committee and had declared open war on it. That 
was quite sufficient to justify, from the first, a challenge 
without appeal to these bulletins which, at the time of 
their publication, were called "grotesque nonsense." 

On the other hand, it seemed all the same very astonish- 
ing that Sir Francis Drake should write to his Minister 
"that he could have every confidence in the authenticity of 
these reports emanating from a person employed as secre- 
tary by the Committee, and who hid his true sentiments 
under an outward show of the most exalted jacobinism." 
And in another despatch he again states precisely : "You 
must know that it is impossible they are misleading us re- 
garding what is said most secretly in the Committee of 
Public Safety." ,This affirmation returns so insistently 
that it would be rash to call it boasting. 

Now, a few soundings authorise one to affirm that 
certain of these astounding allegations of the spy con- 
form to reality. Yes, there was a period when the Com- 
mittee of Public Safety split into two adverse parties and 
on this subject we possess the testimony of several of its 
members. In October 1794, when the Terror was at an 
end, Cambon made, from the tribune of the Convention, 
some unexpected revelations. A member of the Com- 

109 



THE DAUPHIN 

mittee since its creation until July 10th, 1793, he had 
then found out that "Robespierre, Danton, Pache and 
the Commune were meeting at Charenton," — "The fact 
is proved," he said. "It was ascertained there were 
meals. . . . Seeing that they were establishing a Com- 
mittee of Public Safety^ there, whilst you had created 
another in Paris, we had the Minister fetched and sum- 
moned the denounced members. Danton said: 'It is 
true, we have been and dined together; but fear nothing, 
we shall save liberty.' At the same time 'it was made 
known to us that at secret meetings, there was a question 
of proclaiming young Capet King of France. . . .' "^ 
And Cambon having declared that there existed a secret 
register which he and five of his colleagues^ "had had the 
courage to sign" and in which these irregular meetings 
were pointed out, Barere recalled the fact that "at the 
very time . . . they had been held he had denounced them 
from the tribune of the Convention." ^ 

These clandestine conferences between Conventionals 
and members of the Commune have also been noted by 
Courtois in his report on the events of the 9th Thermi- 
dor.^ We read there that "Auteuil, Passy, Vanves and 
Issy were successively the places" chosen by the conspira- 
tors. At Maisons-Alfort they met "at the house of an 
emigre let by Deschamps, aide-de-camp to Hanriot." 
Pache, the brothers Payan and Fleuriot-Lescot "attended 

^Of the persons named by Cambon only Danton formed part of 
the Committee; Robespierre did not join it until August 14th. 

^ Moniteur of the 14th Vendemiaire, year II (October 5th, 1794). 
Reprint XXII, pp. 139 and 140, 

' Guyton-Morveau, Lindet, Breard, Delaunay and Barfere. 

* It was, in fact, at the sitting of May 18th, 1793, that Barfere made 
allusion to the Charenton secret meetings; but how prudently! . . . 
"A few men are meeting together in a certain place. . . ." Moniteur, 
reprint, XVI, p. 423. 

* Report drawn up in the name of the Committees of Public Safety 
and General Safety relating to the events of the 9th Thermidor year 
II, delivered on the 8th Thermidor year III on the eve of the an- 
niversary of the fall of the tyrant, by E. B. Courtois, Deputy for 
the Aube. Paris, National Printing Works, Floreal, year IV. 

110 



PLOTS 

these criminal secret meetings."^ As to the meetings at 
Choisy, at which Robespierre, Lebas, Danton, Hanriot 
and his aides-de-camp, Dumas and Fouquier-Tinville of 
the revolutionary Tribunal were present, numerous 
testimonies collected after Thermidor in the town itself 
attest their reality.^ They are not even quite forgotten 
there at the present time, since a few years ago a com- 
memorative inscription was solemnly placed on the house 
where Danton had a lodging, at the house of his accom- 
plice and agent Fauvel. It stands along the banks of the 
Seine, at the place known in the days of the kings as 
"gondola port," a lonely spot formerly, favourable for 
secret gatherings and where, doubtless the fate of the 
little King of the Temple was often deliberated on in the 
course of bitter and stormy discussions. 

The British spy, therefore, did not lie. The members 
of the Committee of Public Safety were drawing nearer to 
the members of the Commune and other influential revo- 
lutionaries at certain secret conferences. Sir Francis 
Drake*s agent had found a means of introducing himself 
in some artful way into these meetings, outside Paris, and 
it was of these and not of the official deliberations at the 
Tuileries he gave an account to his correspondent. Then, 
on that point, is his veracity proved^ since he reports 

*In support of his assertion Courtois cites the denunciation made 
by the popular and republican assembly of Maisons-Alfort. The 
text is given on p. 83 of the Report. 

^Deposition of Fauvel's gardener, of V. Jacques Noury, citizen of 
Choisy, of Alexander Huet-Sourdon, painter at Choisy, of Mar- 
guerite Vacher, n4e Houdin, etc. National Archives, W. 500. The 
carpenter Duplay, Robespierre's host, had relatives at Choisy and 
Maisons-Alfort. 

'In his Conspiration de VEtranger, M. Albert Mathiez, who has set 
forth the question of the British spy at great length, proves that, 
warned by Henin, the chargS d'affaires of the Republic at Constan- 
tinople, the Committee of Public Safety took alarm. Recognising, 
in a communication which reached it from abroad, an absolutely 
correct extract of the report of one of its meetings, it immediately 
suspected in its midst a traitor who alone was able to reveal the 
secret of its deliberations. We see, in M. Mathiez's study, how this 
suspicion, strengthened by other confirmations, cost H6rault de 
Sechelles his life and later had an influence on the condemnation of 
the Dantonists. 

Ill 



THE DAUPHIN 

events which were revealed subsequently to Thermidor, 
that is to say long after the sending of his last bulletin. 
As to the proclamation of young Capet as King of 
France, that was then, in those troubled times, so com- 
monplace and so current an accusation that it had become 
a common pretext. The Committee of Public Safety used 
' it as an arm against the Girondins ;^ it was employed 
against Hebert, "that secret partisan of the Royalty" ;" 
against Danton ;^ it was formulated against Chaumette 
and against Robespierre ; it sent to the guillotine hundreds 
of suspected persons, and we find it so frequently in Fou- 
quier-Tinville's speeches for the prosecution that it ap- 
pears to be a necessary refrain. Now, we are in a di- 
lemma : either the cliief actors in the Revolution were 
cynical bandits, devoid of conscience and imagination, who 
did not even take the trouble to invent, for each slaughter, 
a new pretext for cutting their adversaries' throats ; or 
else the accusation under which they one after the other 
succumbed was well-founded, and one must conclude that 
all of them, without daring to proclaim it publicly, con- 
sidered a return to the constitutional royalty in the 
person of the son of Louis XVI as the saving issue and 
an advantageous solution. We are not availing our- 
selves of paradox, nor offending the memory of the Giron- 
dins, of Danton or of Robespierre by contending that, 

* Saint-Just's Report: "They intended to proclaim the son of the 
late King, Louis XVII and his mother regent." — Moniteur, reprint 
XVII, p. 156. The same grievance reappears in the conclusion of 
the Report: "The documents handed to the Committee of Public 
Safety show . . . that they have attempted to place Capet's son on 
the throne." The same, p. 157. 

- Moniteur. Reprint, XX, p. 98. Couthon speaking in the name of 
the Committee of Public Safety said, with regard to Hebert, on the 
26th Ventose, year II, at the Convention: "They attempted to for- 
ward to the Temple, to the Capet children, a letter, a packet and 
fifty louis in gold. The object of this expedition was to facilitate 
the escape of Capet's son; for the conspirators having formed the 
plan of establishing a Regency Council, the child's presence at the 
installation of the Regent was necessary." Moniteur, Reprint, XIX, 
p. 715. 

' "There existed a party in favour of young Capet and if the gov- 
ernment was favourable ... it would he Danton who would show 
the child to the people." Moniteur, Reprint, XX, p. 100. 

112 



PLOTS 

during the hours when France was In danger, they sacri- 
ficed their democratic opinion to the interests of the coun- 
try and considered the eventuality of a monarchical res- 
toration, the immediate results of which they hoped would 
be the retreat of the foreigner, the pacification of the 
Vendee and the end of Civil discord. Unfortunately for 
the captive child, no one dared to proclaim publicly this 
sure means of reconciliation. Each elaborated it in 
secret and meditated on it in isolation, anticipating for 
his party the guardianship of the little King of whom the 
more they thought the less they spoke. Yes, in the year 
of great anguish which followed the death of Louis XVI, 
when France, disorganised and led astray from the path 
of its ancient tradition, foresaw the final collapse as 
imminent, there was to be found, among those who were 
responsible for the great confusion, a number of sincere 
patriots who, repenting, made an effort to stay the tor- 
rent ; others devoted themselves to the task with a personal 
object, foreseeing that he who could put his hand on the 
hostage of peace, concord and power sheltered in the 
Temple would become the master of the country; several 
worked at it merely through fear, knowing full well that 
the infant-king would be a pledge of impunity for his 
liberator, and one must also count the adventurers whose 
low instincts became exasperated with cupidity at the 
thought of that "whelp" whose possession would assure 
the one who had the luck to claim him, safety of life, 
money, influence, honours and renown. One must not 
attribute the fierce struggles and sanguinary foumees 
which redden the history of the French Revolution to 
mean rivalries ; they were the episodes of the desperate 
battle waged for the conquest of the orphan toward whom 
all ambitions converged and whom the Commune as jailor 
guarded closely in the sole fear of seeing itself deprived 
of a most valuable prey. That is why the evocation of 
that amiable, graceful and interesting child, who, still at 
the age of thoughtlessness, the object of so many pas- 

113 



THE DAUPHIN 

sions, intrigues, vows, manoeuvres, sighs, factions and 
appetites, played ball under the eye of his guardians in 
the anteroom of his prison or, kneeling down near his 
mother, spelt out, in his History of France, the exploits 
of his ancestors, remains, among the pictures with which 
the annals of the world are rendered illustrious, one of 
the most suggestive and most pensively contemplated. 



114 



IV 



SIMON 



We shall admit that, if the thought of the little King 
of the Temple haunted the minds of all politicians, Chau- 
mette in particular must have been in torment. The 
tyrant's son "belonged" to the Commune of Paris, and to 
Chaumette the Commune was wholly obedient.^ He did 
what he liked there, said there only what he consented to 
say, although he spoke daily and copiously. At the time 
of his trial before the revolutionary Tribunal, witnesses 
testified "that he exercised the duties of the public prose- 
cutor of the Commune less as a defender of the people 
than as a dictator"; his speeches for the prosecution 
"resembled rather laws dictated by a legislator than 
opinions . . . submitted to the Council for discussion"; 
he said that "he alone formed a constituted authority"; 
and "he reigned despotically over men's opinion." ^ If 
we have not lost sight of the moral portrait already 
sketched, we shall recollect that this man was not only 
puffed up with his all-powerful authority but sly, cunning, 
insincere under a frank and good-natured exterior. His 
life remains, for those who have most studied it, a constant 
mystery; all agree in saying that what went on under- 
neath it escapes them and that his double-faced and fleet- 
ing figure has prudently guarded its secret. 

Behold a man of ill-repute, lacking in every scruple, a 

'"Chaumette became the King of it, and this little man who had been 
a cabin-boy and afterward a literary man, who wrote me three letters 
to obtain a tutor's post, cast off like a monkish swine, rivalled 
Robespierre. . . ." — Mercier. Le nouveau Paris, Vol. I, p. 160. 

'Bulletin du Tribunal r4volutionnaire, IVth part. Proems de 
Chaumette, No. 36, p. 144. 

115 



THE DAUPHIN 

consummate liar and able to dissemble to such an extent 
that he shed real tears when delivering a touching apology 
for morality ! Yet the treasure which all parties coveted 
was confided in him, — a treasure the possession of which 
would make him, in the event of a political change, safe 
from the punishment from which, without this magic safe- 
guard, he could not escape; this treasure was at his 
mere}' ; he was responsible for it ; he would perish if 
another and more enterprising person succeeded in getting 
possession of it ! Was it possible that he, with all facili- 
ties at his disposal, entering the Temple whenever he liked, 
whilst entrance was forbidden to everyone else, even to 
members of the Convention who called there without a 
special order ; he, knowing completely, through having as- 
sociated with and managed them according to his liking, 
all his colleagues of the Commune, whom he had authority 
over either through fear or comradeship ; he, having alone 
the resource, if his machinations were discovered, of 
putting forward his duty and responsibility as an argu- 
ment, is it possible that such a man, in this situation, did 
not think that it would be too stupid to allow his a.dver- 
saries to profit by such an unexpected advantage and put 
up with this — that one fine night they would come knock- 
ing at his door to announce that little Capet had disap- 
peared and was in flight? There is a phrase from Chau- 
mette's mouth which throws a singular light on his tactics. 
Speaking of his enemies he said: "If we do not forestall 
them they will forestall us."^ 

We have not the pretension to establish here, by proof, 
that Chaumette engineered the Dauphin's escape. We 
are seeking merely to bring into accord certain state- 
ments which have not yet been compared the one with the 
other and the whole of which reveals, without the shadow 
of a doubt, a long and cautiously prepared plan. Did 
the idea originate with Chaumette alone ; or with Hebert, 
his disquieting deputy; or, again, did Chaumette and 
^Qrande EncyclofMie: Article on Chaumette. 

116 



SIMON 

Hebert, collaborate? It matters little; the indisputably 
authentic facts which reveal it bear indifferently the 
stamp of these two men ; though they observed each other 
with distrust, they walked, as is said, "hand in hand" ; as 
neither one nor the other, in so profitable an enterprise, 
could hope to hide himself from his accomplice the best 
thing was to "go shares." 

What strikes one first of all is the absolutely perfect 
agreement between them concerning the future reserved 
for the little King. Hebert appreciated the child's value. 
One day at the Commune he said: "In the mind of both 
royalists and moderates, the King never dies : he is in the 
Temple. If they could seize this phantom they would 
rally around him. . . ." For always and everywhere, — 
at the Hotel de Ville as at the Convention, on the Com- 
mittees as at the secret meeing at Maisons-Alfort or 
Vanves, — it is toward the orphan prisoner that all 
thoughts are directed; this innocent being is the axis 
around which the revolutionary storm whirls. Hebert 
was not of the opinion that the Dauphin should be kept at 
the Temple. "Let this little serpent and his sister be cast 
on a desert island. I do not know any other reasonable 
means of getting rid of them ; and yet we must rid our- 
selves of them at any price. Besides, what is a child when 
the safety of the Republic is at stake? Would not the 
person who could have smothered his drunken father and 
that bad lot his mother in their cradles have done the best 
action imaginable? There you have my opinion, f outre! 
Catch who can !"^ Chaumette, the good apostle, was not 
in favour of "the desert island" but, in a more wheedling 
manner, he set forth a programme similar to that which 
Hebert grossly extolled. After Baron Hue left the 
Temple he determined to see the public prosecutor of the 
Commune in order to obtain from him an authorisation to 
re-enter the service of the royal family. Chaumette re- 
ceived him effusively, spoke to him "confidentially," ve- 

^Le P^re Duchesne, No. 180. 

117 



THE DAUPHIN 

lated his hard and chequered youth which he introduced 
on every occasion, and then, letting all the interest which 
the Dauphin inspired in him be seen, said paternally: "I 
want to give him some education. / shall remove hvm 
from his family in order to make him lose the idea of his 
rank. . . ." ^ Such was the verdict and from before the 
death of Louis XVI. 

Since the young prince had become King, Chaumette 
took much interest in the Temple. At the General 
Council he spoke on the subject almost daily, divulging 
the precautions taken or to be taken, or, even, relating the 
visits he paid there. For he went there very often. 
Hebert also went there sometimes. One night they ar- 
rived together — both drunk. ^ It is thanks to them espe- 
cially that we are informed in regard to the prisoners' 
existence. Materially it was not painful. It seems that 
most of their complaints were favourably received ; as the 
days slipped by supei'vision became less strict ; the great 
bustle of tradesmen, soldiers, servants, labourers, needle- 
women, contractors, laundry-maids, workmen and porters 
who went about the Temple from morning to night created 
a continual moving to and fro in the courtyards and 
gardens. Tlie apartments in the Tower were badly pro- 
tected against this invasion. Wood and water-carriers 
and floor-polishers were coming in there every moment, 
when it was not the lock-smiths, chimney-sweeps or car- 
penters summoned to make some repair or other.^ 
Nearly seven thousand cards a month were distributed,^ 
and one can understand that under those conditions it did 
not require much cunning to gain access to the Queen. 

^Souvenirs du baron Hue, p. 130, 
'Madame Royale. 
'National Archives, F^ 4791. 
^"Note on the quantity of cards: 

200 per day for soldiers 6,000 

100 per decade (ten days) for the Mairie (?) . • 300 

20 administrators' cards per decade 60 

Total per month 6,360 

National Archives, F', 4391. 

118 



SIMON 

We have seen that she received, in addition to Mile. Pion 
and Dr. Brunier, the painter Kocharsky and Baron de 
Batz, the last two in disguise; other visitors as well, re- 
ported very summarily in documents and never referred to 
again ;^ without counting Turgy who, secretly, took 
charge of the correspondence, carried and brought back 
letters written in invisible ink, acted as the Queen^s er- 
rand-man in her relations with Mme. de Seran and Tou- 
lan. Chaumette, well posted up, or believing that he was, 
set to work, after the denunciation by the Tisons, to iso- 
late the prisoners. As for some days past the Queen 
had consented to ascend with her children to the upper 
platform of the Tower to take the air there, he learnt 
that the public at the bottom of the neighbouring streets, 
being able to catch sight of the prisoners "who appeared 
to be sad and dismayed," assembled every morning to be 
on the watch for their promenade.^ The public prose- 
cutor grew anxious, hastened to the Temple, explored the 
platform and brought back his impressions to the Council 
of the Commune, — namely, that from up there it was pos- 
sible to communicate by gestures with confederates posted 

^For example, in the narrative of Madame Royale, "a stranger who 
brought things to my aunt," or that woman whom the reporter, at 
the General Council, did not consider it expedient to name and who 
sent "a letter to the Queen by an unknown person." — General Council 
of the Commune. Sitting of February 16th, 1793. Courrier franqais 
of the 18th. 

^General Council of the Commune. Sitting of March 18th. Cour- 
rier franqais of the 19th. Goret gives precise and interesting details 
regarding these walks. "At the top of the Tower there was a cir- 
cular gallery ... I had chairs carried up and they ascended. The 
gallery was surrounded by a parapet about four feet (1 m. 30) in 
height and barely two feet (0 m. 63) broad. At the four corners 
were little turrets in which the seats had been placed. As soon as 
the public in the neighbourhood saw us, they formed groups in places 
whence they could gaze at us most easily. As the young prince 
showed a desire to look over the parapet, the Queen asked me to 
take him in my arms. 'Mon Dieu, Madame,' I observed to her, 'I 
should much like to satisfy you; but the public who see us and who 
would notice me might be agitated by it.' — 'I did not think of that,' re- 
plied the Queen. 'You are quite right.' " — The newspapers re- 
ported the fact: "March 18th, 1793. The prisoners of the Tower 
walk every morning on the donjon of the Tower. They have been 
seen every day this week." — Courrier franqais of the 19th, p. 153. 

119 



THE DAUPHIN 

in neighbouring' houses. One of the members proposed 
that the parapet be raised "so that the prisoners could 
see nothing save the sky above their heads"; but Chau- 
mette considered the precaution rather too severe. He 
had scruples. "Posterity awaits us," he said, "and al- 
ready we live in History !" And it was decided that the 
loop-holes should be blocked up with Venetian blinds.-^ 

His object was not to torture the prisoners. If he had 
"the inflexibility of a magistrate" he possessed "a father's 
sensibility," as he himself confessed;^ he only sought to 
isolate the Dauphin completely, in order to dispose of 
him at his pleasure, to have him entirely to himself. 
Nothing could be attempted so long as the child lived with 
his mother, sister and aunt, so the first thing to be done 
was to separate him from them. On March 29th a de- 
putation from the Finistere^ section waited on the Com- 
mune to demand the prompt trial of the Queen and 
Elizabeth, and to propose the assembling of the sections 
"with the object of drawing up an address to the Con- 
vention on the measures to be taken to prevent the son of 
Louis XVI succeeding his father." Did Chaumette sug- 
gest this proposal? One cannot say. But he approved 
of it, and the petitioners were granted "the honours of 
the sitting."^ With such emphasis did he declare the 
urgent necessity of confining the prisoners more closely 
that the shoemaker Wolf, who supplied Madame Royale 
and Madame Elizabeth with footwear, took fright and 
wanted to know whether the buskins and boots he sent 
to the Temple were going to be considered as a means of 
correspondence. . . . He declared to the Commune that 
he could answer for the marks "which might be found in 
the supply of six pairs of shoes for Louis Capet's sister 

^General Council of the Commune. Sitting of March 26th. Couv 
rier franqais of the 28th, p. 227. 

''General Council of • the Commune. Sitting of September 7th, 
1793. Courrier franqais of the 9th, p. 93. 

''Saint- Victor quarter. 

^General Council of the Commune. Sitting of March 26th. Cour- 
rier franqais of the 28th. 

120 



SIMON 

and daughter, these shoes having passed from hand to 
hand. . . ."^ The municipality appointed two special- 
ists — one of whom, naturally, was Simon — "to verify 
these shoes and find out whether there was anything 
suspicious in their contexture."^ They now raised a wall 
eighteen feet high around the prison, which they also freed 
from every parasitic construction.^ Owing to the exag- 
gerated strengthening of these precautions, we seem to be 
watching a conjuror preparing a trick and applying him 
to the exaggeration of its apparent difficulty. One might 
explain them if the attempts at escape, the reality of 
which was not doubtful, served to justify their necessity; 
but, on the contrary, they affected to consider these at- 
tempts as being without importance. They had neither 
searched for nor troubled their authors. To such a 
degree that those members of the Commune who had re- 
mained lucid and took the trouble to think could not 
make head or tail of these anomalies. One of them, 
Goret, wrote: "Who instigated all these precautions, 
some of which might be superfluous.? I cannot say. 
Never once did I hear them deliberated upon by the 
General Council, and I have always thought that an oc- 
cult and powerful party had a hand in all that unknown 
to the Comncil and even to the Mayor who presided over 
it";* whilst Verdier, suspecting an enigma, said: "The 
municipal representatives . . . with the exception of those 
initiated in the mysteries, had a closer view of the horrors 
which were happening ; but as to the reasons for them and 
the instruments they knew no more than the other 
citizens."^ 

For some days the little King had been suffering from 

^General Council of the Commune. Sitting of May 2nd, 1793. 
Courrier frangais of the 4th, p. 31. 

'National Archives, A A 53, 1486. 

^General Council of the Commune. Sitting of March 26th. Cour- 
rier franqais of the 28th. 

'Beaucourt, Vol. I, p. 218. 

'The same, Vol. I, p. 236. 

121 



THE DAUPHIN 

a stitch in his side "which prevented him laughing,"^ 
when, on May 9th, a Thursday, about seven in the eve- 
ning, he complained of a violent headache. A high fever 
followed and as the child was also suffering from suffoca- 
tion he was put to bed. The Queen was very anxious and 
immediately asked for a doctor. Her request was sub- 
mitted to the Commune the same evening. Hebert, who 
had gone to the Temple in the afternoon, spoke, attesting 
that it was only "a feigned illness." — "I saw young Capet 
to-day," he said. "He was playing, jumping and ap- 
peared to be very well." In consequence of this testi- 
mony medical advice was refused.^ The day after the 
morrow a member of the General Council was preparing 
to read the young prisoner's health bulletin ; but at the 
demand of those present the president had to pass to the 
order of the day.^ Not until Sunday did the General 
Council consent to send to the Temple, not Dr. Brunier, 
whom the Queen had chosen, but Citizen Thierry, the or- 
dinary prison doctor, in order not to run counter to 
equality. 

The young King was ill for a fortnight. One may date 
his convalescence from May 29th, the day on which Marie 
Antoinette asked the commissioners for the novel Gil Bias 
"to amuse her son." There was a fresh discussion before 
the General Council to which the request was submitted. 
One member — doubtless a frequenter of the Temple — ob- 
served that the child "being very bright and intelligent 
could only learn to play very naughty tricks by studying 

* Madame Royale. 

^ General Council of the Commune. Sitting of May 10th. Courrier 
frangais of the 11th. It is by comparing indications of this kind 
with Madame Royale's narrative that one can judge of the astonish- 
ing exactitude of her account. "The Council," wrote the young 
princess, "derided my brother's illness because Hebert had seen 
him at five o'clock in good health, the fever not having declared 
itself until two hours afterw^ard." She gives Thursday, May 9th, 
as the day vphen this fever made its appearance; but the Courrier 
frangais says it was the 10th inst. Probably an error on the part 
of this journal, through having united two sittings of the Commune 
in one report. 

' Sitting of the 12th. 

122 



SIMON 

the morality and principles of Gil Bias" — "Rather 
Robinson Cmsoe," advised another. A third was indif- 
ferent to the choice of a book. "He's a spoilt child; his 
mother has inculcated him with her principles ; you won't 
spoil him any more. . . ." So Gil Bias was accorded.^ 
For some days nothing more was said about the Temple. 
The Commune was fighting its great battle, gaining its 
great victory; it subjugated the Convention and obtained 
its consent to mutilation. Chaumette was able to believe 
himself omnipotent, to dream of the inaccessible ; for those 
whom he had overthrown were dangerous rivals. We 
possess, in fact, the proof — Couthon and Saint-Just de- 
clared it in the name of the Committee of Public Safety 
— that these Girondins, now conquered, planned "to spike 
the alarm gun, to gain possession of the Temple and pro- 
claim Louis XVII."^ Free from this rivalry, Chaumette 
combined the means of avoiding in the future all similar 
competition. The hour had come to strike the decisive 
blow by separating the Dauphin from his family. As to 
the "women," they would get rid of them afterward at the 
opportune moment. 

In June the child was again in bed. Whilst playing he 
wounded himself and the Queen wished to consult Dr. 
Hippolyte Pipelet, the third of that name, a famous 
specialist who lived in the Rue Mazarine. But the Com- 
mune did not consider it necessary to call in this "artist" 
and decided that "the patient should be treated by the 
ordinary prison truss-maker."^ However, the Queen 
"demanded" Pipelet and obtained him. She had her own 
reasons, and here we see looming on the horizon that 
Satanic conception which, henceforth, was mingled with 
the history of the Temple and raised such a cry of repro- 

* General Council of the Commune. Sitting of May 29th. Courrier 
frangais of the 31st. 

'Moniteur. Reprint, XVII, p. 77. 

' General Council of the Commune. Sitting of June 12tb. Cour- 
rier frangais of the 13th, p. 349. 

123 



THE DAUPHIN 

bation and horror that, after a century had elapsed, its 
echo still persisted. 

One evening in the early days of the month, ^ Hebert 
and Chaumette came to the Temple and saw little Capet 
suffering from the special ailment with which he was at- 
tacked. What dreadful flash of imagination crossed 
their minds as they descended the staircase. f* What 
scurrilities did they utter in the commissioners' room be- 
fore leaving the Temple ? Can one imagine these two men, 
returning on that summer night toward the Hotel de Ville, 
putting their heads together and contriving the plot of 
which they would make use at the appropriate moment, 
appraising all the advantage they could gain by it in 
confiscating the son and killing the mother, — out of 
respect for morality .? For the ignoble accusation sprang 
up on that day, and it was because she was informed of it 
— either by Turgy or someone else — that the Queen 
wished to have recourse to the authority of Dr. Pipelet. 
He himself has informed us of the circumstances of his 
intervention. He had to call on the Commune, where he 
was at first hooted frantically, in his quality as former 
Court doctor. When, at last, he was able to make him- 
self heard and solicited from that band an authorisation 
to enter the Temple, the brawlers attempted to dissuade 
him by declaring "that he would only be paid as for an 
ordinary prisoner. . . ." The next day he entered the 
Tower accompanied by municipal officers who had the 
young prince undressed, placed upright on a chair facing 
the window, and then ordered the doctor "to state that 
the child had in his blood a poison which condemned him 
to death." Particularly did they draw his attention to 
the local ailment, the origin of which they attributed to 
his mother's immodesty. The doctor examined the little 
patient, put a number of questions, and finally recognised 
that "the Prince was perfectly sound," that he had in- 
jured himself whilst riding astride a stick," "as children 
^Madame Royale. 

124 



SIMON 

do," and he inserted in his report the cause and effect of 
this indisposition of which, after due care, "no trace would 
remain."^ On the 23rd the Dauphin descended with the 
Queen to the Temple garden, where he was seen pla3ang 
and rimning about. His animation when at play, his love 
for his mother, his frolicsome gaiety filled the whole prison 
with joy. This "engaging and charming" child coaxed 
the most arrogant of the municipal officers and one of 
them confessed that he could not resist the temptation of 
drawing him aside to embrace him.^ — Capet fls and An- 
toinette "enjoyed an ease which they had not known for 
nine months," wrote a gazetteer. "A number of toys 
suitable for his age have been given to the child. "^ 
These were their last days together. Perhaps, on the eve 
of committing the crime Chaumette felt "his paternal 
sensibility" awaken ; he was a man given to these contracts 
and grew tender by fits and starts. Nevertheless he was 
counting the hours granted to the son and the mother and 
had already fixed that at which their martyrdom should 
begin. 

Those beautiful summer days were pregnant with 
tragedies in the dismal Tower of the Knight Templars. 
Since the authorities had haggled with them over the visit 
of their daughter Pierrette, the Tisons remained gloomy 
and taciturn. This father and mother were jealous of 
Marie Antoinette and spied upon her, — she who had the 
happiness to live with her child; they vented their ran- 
cour on the little King whom Tison accused of being an 
mfoTTner! Since her denunciation of Toulan, Lepitre 
and the others, Tison mere was no longer the same per- 
son: she languished, rose late, refused to take the air 

^Dr. Pipelet's letter with all its technical terms, which we abstain 
from reproducmg, is quoted textually in Preuves authentiques de la 
mort du jeune Louis XVII by Antoine (de Saint-Gervais), second 
edition, 1831, p. 37. Dr. Pipelet wrote this letter from Tours, to 
which he retired and where he died in 1823. 

^Moelle. 

^Courrier franqais. Nouvelles de Paris, June 25th, 1793. 

125 



THE DAUPHIN 

on the platform or in the garden ;^ and when, every night, 
the new commissioners arrived, she was on the watch for 
their coming, stared at them fixedly. . . . Never did those 
whom she had betrayed reappear. Tlien she would enter 
her room and, through the partition, she could be heard 
talking to herself, struggling against the nightmares 
which agitated her.^ She was alarmed at the Dauphin's 
indisposition.^ "Suppose he were to die through lack of 
care!" Remorse at being the cause of all the evil tor- 
tured her. Thierry, the prison doctor, attended her;* 
but her ailment was not one of those that can be cured by 
remedies. On June 28th her husband forced her to re- 
veal to the commissioners that the Queen and Madame 
Elizabeth carried on a daily correspondence with Turgy. 
She descended to the Council room carrying as proof a 
candlestick on the save-all of which a drop of sealing-wax 
had fallen. Was it when speaking to the commissioners 
that she learnt "what was in preparation".'' Did she 
detect an allusion to the plan of tearing away the Dauphin 
from his mother, or had she guessed it owing to certain 
changes in the regular life of the Temple? The apart- 
ment on the second story, closed since the death of Louis 
XVI, was, indeed, re-opened ;^ and two new turnkeys had 
come on duty.^ Mme. Tison understood. Breathless, 
she ascended to her room. At ten at night there was a 
knocking at her window. On asking what was wanted of 
her, a commissioner's voice replied that Pierrette was 
downstairs and wished to see her. "Pierrette? No, that 
could not be ; she never came as late as that !" And Mme. 

^Madame Royale. 

^he same. 

^The same. 

*"To the Citoyenne Tison, six visits." National Archives, F', 4392. 

°The seals had been removed from the apartment on the second 
floor, vacant since the King's death, April 29th. Temple Papers. 

*"The new arrangements made at the Temple prison necessitating 
a more active supervision, the Commission entrusted with the prison- 
ers' safety has appointed two new turnkeys. The Council has fixed 
their salary at 1200 livres per annum." General Council of the 
Commune, sitting of June 28th. Courrier frangais of the 30th. 

126 




THE EXAMINATION OF THE DAUPHIN BY DR. PIPELET, 
IN THE TEMPLE (MAY, 1793) 
Sketch by Vieu. Private Collection 



SIMON 

Tison declined to come down. However, her husband in- 
tervened and dragged her into the staircase, where, re- 
sisting, she shouted that they wanted to take her to prison. 
At last she was pushed into the Council room. Her 
daughter was there right enough ; she had taken advan- 
tage of the cool of the evening to come and embrace her 
parents. The mother was reassured; but when it was 
necessary for her to ascend to her room she again stoutly 
refused to move. This time she was frightened of re- 
turning to the upper quarters and finding herself in the 
presence of that Queen whose child they were going to 
steal in two days' time. At this Tison pere flew into a 
passion and the municipal officers began to hustle her 
about. Wlien, at last, they succeeded in getting the 
woman to the anteroom on the third floor she caught sight 
of the Queen, whose dinner was on the point of being 
served by Turgy, Marchand and Chretien. Mme. Tison 
walked straight to her and without heeding the municipal 
representatives threw herself at the Queen's feet. 
"Madam," she said, "I ask for Your Majesty's pardon. 
I am a wretch. For I am the cause of your death and 
that of Madame Elizabeth. . . ." The prisoners raised 
her to her feet with kindness, but the woman, happening 
to catch sight of Turgy, became troubled and once more 
fell on her knees, before him, and exclaimed amidst her 
sobs: "Turgy, pardon me! I am the cause of your 
death. . . ." ^ Seized with terrible convulsions, Mme. 
Tison was then dragged away. Doctors came on the fol- 
lowing day and certified she was insane. The Commune 
decreed that she should be taken care of outside the 
Tower and on July 1st eight men, who had a difficulty in 
holding her, conducted her to the Temple Palace, where 
she was placed under guard.^ 

That same day there was issued the decree of the Com- 

^Turgy. 

^'Turgy and General Council of the Commune, sitting of June 39th. 
Courrier frcmgais of July 1st. 

127 



THE DAUPHIN 

mittee of Public Safety ordering that the Dauphin should 
be placed in the hands of a teacher and henceforth should 
live "in a separate apartment, the most secure in the 
Tower."^ The decree had been petitioned for by the 
Commune, and one can hardly doubt of the way in which 
this body announced it to the Parisian population, affect- 
ing to lay the whole responsibility for it on the shoulders 
of the National Convention. "Since the execution of 
Louis XVI," announced the Courrier franfais, "the Con- 
vention appears to have completely forgotten the mem- 
bers of his family detained in the Temple. The Com- 
mittee of Public Safety has just occupied itself with them, 
and in consequence of its decrees the son of the former 
King will be separated from his mother." The decree did 
not order isolation properly so called ; it did not forbid all 
relations between the Queen and her son, but only con- 
tinued cohabitation. It was the Commune which cruelly 
increased its severity. Thus, the Committee having left 
the appointment of the teacher to its judgment, Chau- 
mette confided or approved that they confide this mission 
to his zealot Simon, and this choice, to those who knew 
the man, must have seemed a mockery. Ignorant, 
stunted, blundering, absolutely uneducated, incapable of 
writing a correct or even readable line, the cobbler pos- 
sessed but one quality which justified his protector's de- 
cision — passiveness. If, in choosing him, the Public 
Prosecutor of the Commune, who, as we have seen, feared 
"the judgment of History," had not the sole object of 
assuring himself of a docile instrument at the child's side, 
his preference for this boor would remain inexplicable. 
Moreover, nobody can suppose that he was imposed upon 
by a vote of the Commune.^ We know what the sit- 

* It is useful to note that Robespierre was the initiator of the sep- 
aration of the Dauphin and the Queen. On March 27th, 1793, he pro- 
posed that the Queen be tried, whilst her son remained a prisoner in 
the Temple. — Moniteur. Reprint XV, 817. 

'Since the burning of the Hotel de Ville, in 1871, we possess only 
the summary reports of the sittings of the Commune published by 
the newspapers of the time. As regards the Temple they inform us 

128 



SIMON 

tings of the General Council were like and the submission 
of all the members to the opinion of the "Master." 
Simon would never have been appointed if he had not 
been Chaumette's man, if Chaumette had not been his pro- 
tector, colleague in the Theatre-Fran9ais section, guard- 
ian and surety. Promotion came most unexpectedly to 
the shoemaker, the General Council having granted him, 
at the same time as the title of Fenelon's successor as 
educator of the son of the King of France, a salary of 
9,000 Ivvrea.^ 

On July 3rd, after the prisoners' supper, that is at ten 
o'clock at night, the municipal representatives on duty at 
the Temple, Eudes, a stone-cutter, Gagnant, a painter, 
Veron, a perfumer, Celher, a semi-official counsel, Deveze, 
a carpenter, and a certain Arnaud exercising the singular 
profession of "reader-secretary," appeared before the 
Queen and read to her the decree of the Committee of 
Public Safety. Of the heart-rending scene which fol- 
lowed we possess but two very succinct accounts. The 
first is the report of the Commissioners of the Commune, 
as follows: "After various earnest entreaties, the widow 
Capet at last determined to deliver her son, who was then 
led into the appointed apartment and placed in the hands 
of Citizen Simon who is in charge of it. We would ob'- 
serve moreover that the separation took place with all 

sufficiently. But what hiatuses there are all the same! We see, in 
the Courrier frangais of July 8th, that, at the sitting of the 6th, 
there was mentioned a previous decree appointing Simon teacher to 
the Dauphin. Now, previously, there is nowhere any question of 
this decree. Is not this an indication that the vote was conjured 
away? When, six months later, there was a question of appointing 
a steward at the Temple, we see, at least, that, the General Council 
having first of all proceeded to call over the names of members, 
the ballot produced 55 voters. Citizen Lelifevre obtained 51 votes. 
Courrier r^publicain of the 16th Pluviose, year II. Is it not sur- 
prising that in the case of Simon's nomination things were not done 
with the same regularity and that they are not related with similar 
details? 

^"The General Council decides that Simon and his wife shall be 
paid at the same rate as the Tisons." Now, Tison received 6,000 
livres per annum and his wife 3,000. National Archives, F*, 1308, 

129 



THE DAUPHIN 

the sensibility which one would expect under the cir- 
cumstances, in which the magistrates of the people showed 
every deference compatible with the severity of their 
duty.^ The other narrative, stamped with greater emo- 
tion, is Madame Royale's. "On July 3rd, at ten o'clock 
at night, they read us a decree of the Convention order- 
ing that my brother should be separated from mother 
and placed in the most secure apartment of the Tower.^ 
My brother had hardly heard this than he uttered loud 
cries and threw himself into mother's arms, demanding 
that he should not be parted from her. Mother was also 
struck with horror by this new order and, determined not 
to give my brother up, defended the bed where he was 
against the municipal officers. The latter, equally de- 
termined to have him, threatened to use violence and sum- 
mon the guard from below to take him away by force. An 
hour passed in pourparlers, defence and tears from all of 
us. At last mother consented to give up her son. We 
got him up and, after he was dressed, mother surrendered 
him to the municipal representatives, whilst bathing him 
with tears, as though she foresaw that she would never see 
him again. The poor little fellow embraced us all most 
tenderly and, weeping, departed with the men." 

The subject is a rich one and lends itself to amplifi- 
cation: the three weeping princesses forming a rampart 
around the bed of the affrighted child, aM'akened from his 
beauty sleep and clinging to his mother with all the 
strength of his little arms ; the necessarily sorry attitude 
of the six men struggling against the three women and 
threatening them with the soldiers ; Marie-Therese's 
daughter for a whole hour suppliant before the stone-cut- 
ter, the perfumer and the carpenter; the painful tearing 
away and hustling of the child as they took him off, 
calling for his mamma in his little broken voice. And the 

^ General Council of the Commune, sitting of July 4th, 1793. — Cour- 
rier frangdis of the 6th, p. 47. 

^ Once more we note that the princess's memory was as trustworthy 
as it was retentive. 

130 



SIMON 

heavy iron doors which clanged to; and the men with 
scarves pushing the little thing, who clung to the iron 
bannister, along the staircase ; and the entrance into that 
apartment on the second floor where he had not been since 
that other tearful evening when his father, about to die, 
pressed him to his heart for the last time . . . ; and the 
silent shame of those municipal representatives when, 
having gained the victory, they once more met together 
at their bivouac in the Council room. . . . They were 
not monsters ; not one of them, doubtless, had the soul of 
a torturer; several, most certainly, were fathers, and 
among these there were trembling lips and wet eyes at the 
thought of the little fellow who, above, was struggling 
with his new warder and refusing to go to bed. . . . All 
these commissioners were, but a few months before, good 
laughter-loving fellows without a thought of playing at 
being Spartans ; but the Chaumettes and the Heberts had 
intoxicated them with the poison of murderous Utopias 
and had held up to them as a sacred duty that which, 
formerly, these simple men would have considered as a 
crime. Perhaps also they obeyed only fear. . . . No 
matter ! Whatever air of bravado and flippant manner 
they may have affected, they felt disgust at the work they 
had done and not one of them could have slept peacefully 
that night in the accursed Tower, the sonorous echoes of 
which brought to their ears the women's cries and the 
sobbing of a child. Yes, the picture would be of a certain 
efi^ect and would not falsify history, for one may load it 
with colours without fear that its tonality exceeded, — or 
rather without hope that it attained the intensity of the 
scene to be painted ; but the misfortunes of the little King, 
innocent and a martyr, have inspired, apart from a few 
inimitable pages, so many tender commentaries that the 
clear outlines of the truth are no longer distinguishable 
under the superabundance of glosses. In such a subject, 
still more than in any other, it is advisable to keep to a 
simple statement of rare authentic pieces of evidence. 

131 



THE DAUPHIN' 

though the narrative should displease by its dryness ; 
though it should even disappoint the sensibility of readers, 
surprised at not finding in history, thus stripped of orna- 
ments, the touching impression which legend left them. 

We here come to a period in the life of the Dauphin 
where we shall find ourselves in disagreement with a tra- 
dition more than a century old : that of the cruelty of 
the shoemaker Simon and the systematic tortures he in- 
flicted on his "pupil." How did this tradition arise? 
Perhaps we must seek for its origin only in the obnoxious 
contrast between the ward's illustrious birth and the 
rouffh trade of his "mentor." A cobbler tutor to the 
Dauphin of France! This exaggerated conception 
raised so unanimous a reprobation among contemporaries, 
atavistically devotees of the ancient royal race, that their 
imagination was given, on this subject, full rein and, by 
induction, made up for lack of certain information. 
When the Restoration came the legend was strengthened 
and amplified by the misdeeds of party spirit : each con- 
tributed his piece of gossip or anecdote, alleged to have 
been gathered from living witnesses, ex-jailors overcome 
with remorse, former members of the Commune tardily re- 
pentant, and it is from this invading thicket we have to 
disengage the history of the Temple. Stripped of these 
grievous additions, it appears singularly unpleasing, of 
such barrenness as to disconcert those who knew it when 
luxurious and thick-spreading. 

Confining ourselves to almost certain information, we 
know very little about Simon's administration and the 
manner in which he behaved toward the young prince. 
It looks very much as though he continued to be what we 
have seen he was before, when he was bestirring himself 
as clerk of the works at the Temple : not a bad but a dull- 
witted man, inordinately imbued with the extravagant 
bathos heard at his section or at the Commune, yet cap- 
able of showing kindness or even tenderness. In his 
stupidity, he mistook all those fine talkers for apostles 

132 



SIMON 

and their phrases for the new gospel; he had faith and 
naively imagined they had conscientiously placed him 
there in the interest of young Capet, in order to extirpate 
the aristocratic prejudices with which the mind of this 
descendant of kings was encrusted. Simon was not a 
torturer; he was a sincere simpleton, believing that 
through mere contact with an "undefiled" one like him- 
self the child would become democratised and ascend from 
the rank of prince to the position of a man. Rousseauism 
was at the bottom of his foolishness, for though he had 
not read the works of Jean Jacques, he had confidently 
adopted his pedagogic themes through having vaguely 
heard them talked about. 

Concerning the first relations between the master and 
the weeping Dauphin^ on the night of July 3rd we know 
nothing. There is no testimony to tell us whether the 
shoemaker took the child with him into the room Louis 
XVI had occupied and which he inherited, or whether he 
decided that little Capet should sleep alone in the room 
formerly inhabited by Clery.^ No change had been made 
in the furnishing,^ so Simon, for the first time in liis life, 
stretched himself out under damask curtains on a broad 
deep bed made soft by three mattresses. He was able 
to sample the comfort of the arm-chairs and the savour of 
the three meals cooked by the chefs of the royal kitchens 
and brought into the anteroom in state by the waiters. 
Nothing, indeed, had been changed as regards the 

^ "My brother wept for two whole days without being able to con- 
sole himself and demanded to see us. . . ." Madame Boyale. 

* It is very probable that the Dauphin had to share the room with 
the Simon household, anxious not to be separated from him. 

' Seven months after the death of Louis XVI, the furniture of the 
King's bedroom was still there. Hebert proposed to burn the bed 
as well as the wardrobe of the tyrant. Naturally the Commune 
adopted the proposal (sitting of September 24th, 1793) ; but at the 
next meeting Dunoin objected that it was "absurd to burn a bed 
worth at least one thousand crowns. Moreover, the Council had 
no right to do it. If it were necessary to make a bonfire of every- 
thing the King had touched, they would have to cast into the flames 
property to the value of ten millions — nay, one hundred millions!" 
The decree was annulled. — General Council of the Commune. Sitting 
of September 26th. Courrier franqais of the 28th. 

133 



THE DAUPHIN 

prisoners' regime and when Mme. Simon arrived at the 
Temple the ex-char-woman must have formed a great idea 
of the duties with which her husband had been invested. 
She did not appear until four days later ;^ that, at least, 
is what we must infer from the decree of the Commune 
dated July 6th which allowed her to share the regular 
godsend that had come to her man. Singularly clumsy 
and vulgar, she was, however, like the great majority of 
the women of the people of Paris, charitable and kind; 
she had shown devotion, without counting her labour, to 
those who, wounded on August 10th, were attended to in 
the Convent of the Franciscans. It is as inaccurate as it 
is unjust to represent her as a lazy drink-loving shrew. 

The handing over of the Dauphin to Simon caused a 
noteworthy sensation in Paris. Either because the news 
appeared improbable, or because the public in its mali- 
ciousness guessed Chaumette's game, or, again, because 
some indiscreet accomplice talked too much, it was 
rumoured throughout the whole city that the Commune 
and its friends of the Mountain had taken possession of 
the son of Louis XVI merely with the object of using him 
as a weapon against their opponents. The young prince, 
it was declared, was no longer at the Temple : he had been 
carried in triumph to St. Cloud. Robespierre fulminated 
from the tribune of the Convention against these seditious 
rumours,^ which spread as far as Lj^ons, where, on July 
14th a refugee, Barety, deputy for the Hautes-Alpes, af- 
firmed that "rumours of a monarchical restoration were 
rife in Paris." A strange thing: it was Chaumette whom 

* "The young son of Louis XVI being still unable to do without 
the care of a woman, it has been decided that the woman Simon . . 
shall take charge of this child, concurrently with her husband." 
General Council of the Commune. Sitting of July 6th. Courrier 
frangais of the 8th. 

' "It is declared that the hypocritical enemies of liberty are spread- 
ing the news that it is the Mountain, that it is the people of Paris, 
that it is the General Council of the Commune, that it is you, found- 
ers of the Constitution . . . who wish to restore the throne of the 
tyrant whom you have punished in favor of his son." Moniteur, 
Reprint. Sitting of the Convention of July 7th, XVII, p. 72. 

134i 



SIMON 

public opinion placed at the head of the movement and 
people alleged "that he had had a conference with the 
Queen."^ Immediately the Committee of General Safety 
sent four of its members" to the Temple in order to make 
sure that none of the prisoners had disappeared. Their 
report stated that they found "Capet's son in the first 
apartment^ quietly playing draughts with his mentor.* 
As Simon had up to then kept him shut up on the second 
floor, for fear, doubtless, that the child's tears would 
soften the hearts of the soldiers on guard, these had con- 
cluded that the public rumour was justified and that the 
Dauphin was really no longer at the Temple. So the 
members of the Convention led him into the garden to show 
him. It was then, before all these men, that this brave 
little prince of eight years of age had the courage to pro- 
test against the treatment of which he was a victim. He 
asked for his mamma, demanded "that they show him the 
law which ordered separation from her. . . ." ^ Imagine 
the attitude of those deputies of the Convention, of those 
Commissioners of the Commune, obliged, either to mal- 
treat the innocent boy to impose silence on him, or, with 
bent heads and faces flushed with shame, to listen to him 
as he raised his little voice and strove to speak as a king. 
The report of the delegates of the Committee of General 
Safety is the earliest as regards date of the rare docu- 
ments which inform us of the shoemaker's attitude toward 
his pupil: a suspicious document, one may say, for if the 
members of the Convention had surprised Simon in the act 
of thrashing his victim they would, without the slightest 
doubt, have abstained from mentioning the fact. Be it 
so. But other indications bear testimony, if not to 
Simon's solicitude, at least to his moderation. Dr. Pipe- 
let, honoured with the Queen's entire confidence and who 

^ Bittard des Portes. L' insurrection de Lyon, 
' Drouet, Chavot, Dumont and Maure. 
'The anteroom on the second floor. 
*Moniteur. Reprint, XVII, p. 73. 
** Madame Royale. 

135 



THE DAUPHIN 

came, at her formal request, to examine the Dauphin 
about June 20th, as already described, continued for a 
whole month the treatment he had ordered for the child ;^ 
he saw him, therefore, frequently, if not daily, during the 
first twenty days of the shoemaker's administration. 
Concurrently with Pipelet, another medical man attended 
the prisoner, — namely, Dr. Thierry, whom they con- 
temptuously called the "prison-doctor." Yet he had 
been consulting-physician to the King,^ and Mme. de 
Tourzel congratulated herself on knowing that the young 
prince Avas attended by this celebrated doctor. She met 
Thierry at the house of Marshal de Mouchy and saw him 
"deeply touched by the situation of the royal family. He 
went to find Brunier to inquire about the child's tempera- 
ment . . .^ and took as his assistant, on his visits to the 
Temple, Dr. Soupe, a master of surgery."^ 

Thierry came sixteen times to the prison "after the 
separation," the account for his honorarium states pre- 
cisely,^ and his last consultations date from the first day 
of January 1794; therefore they stretch over the whole 
period of Simon's sojourn.*' Moreover, the son of Louis 
XVI was not seriously ill. He was afflicted at the time he 
was still living with his mother with a "verminous af- 
fection,"^ and the sole object of the doctors' visits was 
to prevent a return of this indisposition. On July 4th, 

* "He followed the treatment for this indisposition during a month." 
Letter from Dr. Pipelet, loc. cit. 

^Almanack Royal for 1792. Thierry, doctor of medicine of the 
Faculty of Paris, Rue St. Honore, opposite the Hotel de Noailles: 
'Tourzel, Vol. II, p. 309. 

* Almanack Royal for 1793. Soupe, Quai des Orfevres, near the 
Pont-Neuf. 

^National Archives, F% 4792. 

^ Thierry counts a total of 107 visits, both to the Dauphin and to 
Mme. Royale, as well as to the woman Tison, and he adds: "the 
dearness of carriages, all the time it takes to reach the apartment, 
to enter and leave the Temple (sic), all the appointments with 
Citizen Soupe, five or six with Citizen Pipelet, and 112 steps to 
ascend, with the result that a single visit takes nearly two 
hours. . . ." 

' "At the end of which," notes Thierry's account, "he got rid of a 
prodigious quantity of worms." 

136 



SIMON 

the first day of life in common with the cobbler, there was 
brought to him from Robert, an apothecary, a medicinal 
brew "made in a water-bath with veal, the thighs and 
backs of frogs, the juice of plants and terre foliee." 
Every day in the month of July the same concoction was 
furnished^ and, intimate though these details may be, 
they nevertheless have their importance since they prove 
the minute attentions paid the prisoner. Is it not ap- 
parent that they destroy at the same time the persistent 
legend of blows, jugs of cold water poured into his body, 
bumpers of wine and brandy which they forced him to 
absorb notwithstanding his repugnance? Can we be- 
lieve that doctors like Pipelet and Thierry would never 
have noticed any symptom revealing so wretched a life, 
or would they have tolerated that others should try to 
make ill, whilst they were giving him their care, the young 
prince in whom they took so much interest? 

As regards the food, there had been no restriction since 
the death of Louis XVI. At the sitting of the General 
Council on September 1st a member observed that "the 
prisoners' table is still served with the same profusion";^ 
and when, in the autumn, the great reforms were made, 
it was decided "that no modification should be made in 
the regime of little Capet. "^ His instructor took him for 
walks in the gardens and on the platform of the Tower. 
He had a billiard-table put in one of the bedrooms of the 
prison,^ and there the commissioners on duty used to meet 

1 Except the 26th, the 29th, the 30th and the 31st, when the child 
was given enemas composed of "Corsican coralline, lemon juice 
and olive-oil." Robert's bill mentions "a syringe with its ivory bar- 
rel, 14 livres." National Archives, the same files. 

= Courrier franqais of September 3, 1793. 

^ General Council of the Commune, sitting of December 23rd. Cour- 
rier frangais of the 25th. 

* Account from Le Marchand, carpenter, Rue des Tournelles, for 
"putting up and fixing the cue-racic of the billiard table." National 
Archives, F', 4392. The room where this billiard table was placed is 
not exactly indicated. As there was no room for such a piece of 
furniture in the Big Tower it appears very probable that it was put 
in Monsieur Berthelemy's former billiard room on the first floor 
of the Little Tower, that is, in the room where the Dauphin and Mme. 

137 



THE DAUPHIN 

him. Bringing the child with him, admission was granted, 
to play with the tyrant's son, whilst the municipal repre- 
sentatives made cannon, to a little girl named Clouet who, 
every ten days, when the clean linen was brought back, 
accon]^anied her mother, one of the laundry-women of 
the Temple.^ For the Dauphin's amusement Simon pro- 
cured a dog, whom the boy named Castor,^ and "of whom 
he was very fond." As a further diversion for his pupil, 
who had a great desire to keep birds, the shoemaker had 
an oak aviary with twenty-two perches^ placed in the 
embrasure of one of the deep windows of his apartment, 
and under the pretext of "giving the birds light" he re- 
moved one of the planks of the wooden chimney-funnel 
that obstructed the casement.* We also see in the bills 
of the tradesmen of the Temple that one of the turrets 
was transformed into a pigeon-cote,^ and for a very long 
time afterward mentions such as "seeds for little Capet's 
pigeons" ^ still appear in the accounts. Simon did still 
more. In Mathey's dwelling, that of the door-keeper of 
the tower, he had discovered another cage, — a marvellous 
cage this one wliich came, it is believed, from the Prince 
de Conti's furniture store-house, since it was made "en- 
tirely of silver with moulded gilded garlands and 
crystals." Moreover, it included "chimes and a bird 
organ to instruct the birds," Its construction was ad- 
mirable, for there were "an infinity of drums, springs, 

de Tourzel slept on the first night of their captivity. On one of 
the MS. plans preserved in the National Archives this room bears, 
in fact, the word billiard. 

^ Mme. Clouet had vi^ashed Mme. Roy ale's linen since 1778. Na- 
tional Archives, FS 1040. 

^Declaration of the woman Simon. National Archives, F^ 6806. 

'Third supplementary account for carpentry work done at the 
Temple during the last months of the first year of the Republic and 
the first month of the second year (July to October, 1793) by Le 
Marchand, carpenter. Supplied an oak aviary with thirty-two 
perches. — Paid to Citizen Lere, pin-maker, for the wire netting of 
the aviary: — at Citizen Simon's, placing and fixing of wire netting 
on the window of the aviary. . . . National Archives, F*, 4392. 

* The same. 

*"The pigeon-turret," says the above mentioned account. 

'^National Archives, F% 4393. 

138 



SIMON 

fusees^ bellows and triggers, by means of which the birds, 
on alighting on one of the perches to eat, made the bird- 
organ play." Simon carried the cage to his apartment, 
but as the mechanism no longer worked he entrusted it, 
on his own authority, to Citizen Bourdier, a clock-maker 
of the Quai de I'Horloge du Palais, undertaking to pay 
for the repair of the marvellous toy out of his own 
pocket.^ 

The shoemaker and his wife also saw to the Dauphin's 
cleanliness and dress. For instance, we find in the ac- 
counts mention of "a thermometer for baths"; whilst the 
laundry bills prove that his linen was abundantly and 
constantly renewed. He had many costumes. They 
brought forth from wardrobes the coloured garments he 
wore before January 21st, for henceforth he no longer 
wore mourning for his father. In addition to two white 
dimity frock coats which Bosquet, former tailor to the 
King, supplied for the summer, he delivered in September 
a nankeen jacket, waistcoat and trousers, a silk-lined 
frock coat of Louviers cloth, a small dress-coat, a waist- 
coat and trousers of the same stuif ;^ and although the 
Temple accounts are divided between too many various 
series of records to be able to pride oneself upon an 
absolutely complete investigation, if we make an exception 
of the above mentioned "jacket" and the "trousers," 
democratic garments adopted by the fanatics who owed to 
that affectation their nickname of Sans-culottes, one may 
state that Simon did not force his pupil to put on "the 
livery of the Revolution." There was not a carmagnole 
in the boy's wardrobe; not a red cap.^ A drawing done 

^ When Bourdier had completed this delicate piece of work Simon 
was no longer at the Temple. The bill amounted to 300 livres. The 
Commune considered this sum exorbitant and refused to pay it. 
General Council of the Commune. Sitting of the 4th of Pluviose, 
year II. Courrier frangais of the 6th. 

'^National Archives, old file, E 6307, quoted by Beauchesne. 

* It was therefore only as an exception, for "amusement," that the 
cobbler dressed the Prince up in these symbolic costumes. "Simon 
put a red cap on his head and a carmagnole on his body." Madame 
Boy ale. 

139 



THE DAUPHIN 

from life in the autumn of 1793 shows us the Temple 
courtyard, where among sentries armed with pikes or 
guns, municipal representatives, working gardeners and 
others, Simon passes accompanied by the Dauphin. The 
shoemaker is wearing a Phrygian cap of a size in keeping 
with his republicanism ; but "Capet's son" wears a broad- 
brimmed felt hat and over a broad ribbon sash the little 
dress-coat which many of his portraits have popular- 
ised.^ 

Thus we find in the authentic documents the original 
germ of all the heart-rending narratives that have caused 
so many tears to flow: the favourite bird crushed by a 
savage municipal officer, toys broken by a brutal hand, 
blows from fire-dogs which knocked the little prince over 
half dead; startled awakenings from his sleep on cold 
nights. But of these incidents themselves not a trace. 
Moreover, they are contradicted by everything we know 
for certain. We cannot doubt the good faith and sin- 
cerity of the early historians of Louis XVII who collected 
them from survivors of the Temple; but was the memory 
of these very faithful, and was there not in the sophistica- 
tion, unconscious or not, of their recollections a sort of 
remorse, of revenge even for an involuntary and too 
docile complicity in the terrible crime with wliich they 
were haunted? To charge Simon with every piece of 
villainy, was that not a way of exculpating themselves, 
of delivering themselves from the nightmare to the detri- 
ment of a dishonoured memory? 

For a crime was committed and one so much the more 
odious as it was hypocritical. We may be certain of this, 
that Chaumette and Hebert did not deliver the King's 
son to the shoemaker in order that he should "get rid of 
him"; they knew too well the value of the hostage they 
held and who, when the hour came, was to divert the 
threatening lightning from their heads. Simon's mission 

^This drawing has been reproduced in La captivite et la mort de 
Marie Antoinette. 

140 



SIMON 

was quite different: he was "to democratise the royal 
child, inculcate in him the principles and teach him the 
ways of the people." — "I will make him lose the idea 
of his rank" declared Chaumette. "The little whelp must 
lose the recollection of his royalty" said Hebert, going 
one better. It was at that the cobbler worked — oh! yes, 
in his own manner, which was not that of a dreamer like 
Rousseau or of a syllogistic ruffian such as Clootz. 
Simon's manner consisted simply in initiating his pupil 
in the beauties of style of the Pere Duchesne and in the 
coarse speech of street blackguards. No more orthog- 
raphy, — ^he would have had a difficulty to teach it ; no 
more fables or scripture history or any other in which 
the misdeeds of a crowd of cruel tyrants and exploiting 
priests were set down. The descendant of Louis XIV 
and the Roman Csesars was to spell out the Droits de 
VHomme posted up in the anteroom and he was to sing 
the songs of the people. Simon did not know much more 
himself and he prided himself on being a good patriot. 
The worst was he thought he was doing well and gaining 
by this pedagogic exploit the gratitude of posterity. 
His inaptitude was such that his self-esteem as an edu- 
cator must have increased on hearing his pupil's first oath. 
And he had not long to wait. Who has not noted the 
ease with which children retain everything they ought not 
to hear and how quick their pliant mind is to imitate, how 
greedy they are for forbidden fruit? A few b . . . s and 
a few f . . . s, after the manner of Hebert, were sufficient 
to make the young king show himself in that kind of elo- 
quence as fluent as his professor. And the latter continued 
his lessons, already flattered by their good effect and the 
compliments their success brought him. Alas ! unex- 
ceptionable testimony does not permit one to doubt, as one 
would wish, the too rapid result of that execrable prof- 
anation. First of all, there is the evidence of Madame 
Royale, ever so scrupulously accurate. "Every day we 
heard him singing the Carmagnole, the air of the Marseil- 

141 



THE DAUPHIN 

laise and other horrors with Simon. He made him sing 
them at the windows in order to be heard by the guard, 
with terrible oaths against God, his family and the aristo- 
crats." There was such a scandal that one August day 
the municipal representative Leboeuf, the head of a school, 
could not resist questioning Simon and reproaching him 
for the speeches he delivered before his pupil. We possess 
no information concerning the altercation itself. But, 
one evening, at the General Council, Leboeuf was de- 
nounced for, "having complained that young Capet swore 
and that he was being given too democratic an education." 
Leboeuf, to crown his audacity, had several times ex- 
pressed the desire that Louis' son should be educated after 
the manner of Telemachus.^ The affair came up again 
on September 5th and this time Chaumette spoke. He 
accused Leboeuf "of having obtained entrance to the 
Temple in a manner unworthy of a magistrate, of having 
found and worshipped an idol there; he had dared to 
reprimand the patriot Simon and "find fault with the 
educating of young Capet as a sans-culotte" ; to which 
Leboeuf replied that, as a schoolmaster, he did not like to 
hear indecent songs, and Simon had taken the liberty to 
repeat such songs in his pupiPs presence. The modest 
municipal representative was "sent to the police" and 
seals were affixed on his papers.^ Two days later, the 
search at the house of the accused not having revealed 
anything suspicious, he was set free ; but to his colleagues' 
invitation to resume his place among them he worthily re- 
plied by sending in his resignation.^ 

The unfortunate Prince, however, did not realise his 
decadence. He was too young for the instincts of deli- 
cacy and distinction which he owed to atavism to be able 
to struggle victoriously against the temptation of that 

^General Council of the Commune. Sitting of August 28th. Cour- 
rier franqais of the 30th. 

'General Council of the Commune. Sitting of September 5th. 
Courrier franqais of the 7th. 

'Sitting of September 10th. 

142 



SIMON 

vulgarity which he considered quite manly ; and then, save 
very rare exceptions, that guardroom language on the 
lips of an eight-year-old king amused without in any way 
revolting those Parisian municipal representatives, for 
the most part born and accustomed to live amongst the 
populace: it was to them a perverse satisfaction to hear 
the son of the proud Austrian woman express himself 
after the manner of a sans-culotte, theeing, thouing every- 
body, uttering oaths and exaggerating the coarseness of 
the role he was playing, — to "play the man," — all the 
more because he received approbation and praise. One 
can see those irresponsible men splitting their sides with 
laughter at every oath from the Dauphin of France, de- 
lighted that he was shameless, degraded, similar to the 
riff-raff of the gutter. 

The Dauphin was ignorant of the fact that his mother 
left the Temple one month after they had dragged him 
.from her arms ; he thought she was still there with Madame 
Royale and Madame Elizabeth on the third floor of the 
Tower ; and here must be placed an incident which reveals 
the prog'ress Simon had obtained from his too docile 
pupil, — a horrible incident and which we must excuse our- 
selves for mentioning, although in a modified form. . . . 
The municipal representative Daujon, a convinced 
enemy of "tyrants" but a distinguished artist and conse- 
quently less unpolished than the majority of his col- 
leagues, was on guard at Simon's and playing bowls with 
the Dauphin. In the "women's" apartment, situated on 
the upper floor, was heard a noise of "jumping and as it 
were dragging of chairs" ; whereupon the child, leaving his 
bowls, cried out impatiently, "Aren't those d . . . d 
b . . . s up there guillotined yet?" — "I did not wish to 
hear the remainder," adds Daujon. "I left the place there 
and then."^ That was all an honest indignant man 
dared to do by way of protest : he "left the place"; and yet 
he had given sufficient proofs of his devotion to the cause 
^Daujon's narrative. 

143 



THE DAUPHIN 

of the people to permit him to fear nothing. Such a 
phrase indicates better than long disquisitions to what an 
extent the General Council had, through Chaumette and 
Hebert, terrorised, enslaved, reduced to silence its mem- 
bers. 

During the whole of July the wretched Queen begged 
permission to see her son, but her request was always 
eluded. She had succeeded in perceiving him by ascend- 
ing to the level of the platform by a staircase situated in 
the closet of her apartment.^ "Her only pleasure was 
to see him through a little window, passing in the distance ; 
she remained there for whole hours on the watch for that 
child so dear." Soon she was deprived of that con- 
solation, for on the night of the 2nd to the 3rd of August, 
"at a quarter past one in the morning," five administra- 
tors of the police came for her, and in a cab, escorted by 
twenty mounted gendarmes, conducted her to the Com- 
ciergerie. 

By transferring Marie Antoinette to the prison of the 
Palais and spreading the rumour of her imminent trial, 
the Committee of Public Safety appears to have had the 
sole object of making the foreign powers, and particu- 

^The position of this staircase is one of the problems of the 
topography of the Temple. There is no doubt about its existence. 
Between the third story and the roof, it does not figure on the plans, 
at least on those we have met with. That is explainable, however, if 
this staircase, which formed so intrinsic part of the construction 
of the Knights Templars, was only, as one may believe, a light wooden 
staircase, quite unused before the sojourn of the Royal family, 
since it was a useless repetition of the big stone staircase ascending 
from the ground to the roof and leading to all the floors. It is very 
astonishing that, when arranging the place for the Queen's use, 
they did not destroy these back stairs, which were of a nature to 
have aroused the suspicion of the guardians. However, on certain 
plans of the Temple, in addition to the grand staircase of the north 
turret, we find another very narrow one in the south turret, between 
the first and the second story; interrupted between the second and 
the third story, we are indeed forced to conclude from Madame 
Royale's narrative that it was to be met with again between the 
third and the roof. A statement which may have its injportance 
from the point of view of certain narratives of pretended escapes 
of the Dauphin, most unacceptable in other respects but which are, 
as far as this staircase is concerned, in agreement with the 
topography. 

144 



SIMON 

larly Austria, decide to depart from their attitude of in- 
difference: it was believed that, in order to save the Queen 
from the scaffold, the Sovereigns of the coalition would 
resolve on advances which had been vainly awaited for 
three months past.-^ The powers did not understand, or 
would not consent to enter into negotiations with the 
government of the Terror, and nobody on the committee 
daring to take the responsibility of delivering the Queen 
to the executioner, the revolutionaries were asking them- 
selves what they were going to do with this embarrassing 
hostage. It was them that at one of those mysterious 
nocturnal sittings, extra regular sittings at which there 
was present that British spy whose intrusion has already 
been noted, Cambon having observed that, perhaps, by 
announcing the approaching trial of the Queen but delay- 
ing its date, they would still have a chance of treating 
with Vienna, Hebert spoke and delivered a savage and 
desperate speech: "I have promised Antoinette's head. 
I will go and cut it off myself if they delay giving it to 
me. I promised it on your behalf to the sans-culottes who 
demand it and without whom you cease to be. . . . Here 
is what will make you decide." Then painting the situa- 
tion of the country broadly, he showed the revolution and 
revolutionaries destined to perish. "All your generals 
betray you and all will continue to betray you ; /, the 
"first of all if ... I saw a good treaty to he made which 
would preserve my life . . . but France will be subdued 
... we shall all perish ... we live, therefore, but for 
vengeance . . . and in perishing let us leave to our ene- 
mies all the germs of their death and in France a de- 
struction so great that its mark will never be effaced ! To 
do that you must satisfy the sans-culottes . . . keep 

^This was also the hope of the Queen herself, her daughter and 
sister-in-law, as is proved by the following lines from Madame 
Royale's narrative: "We could not imagine the unworthy conduct of 
the Emperor who left the Queen, his relative, to perish on the scaffold 
without taking a step to save her. That was, however, what hap- 
pened; but we could not believe in that last act of unworthiness of 
the House of Austria." 

145 



THE DAUPHIN 

alive their heat hj the death of Antoinette . . . that is 
all I have to say to you regarding my opinion. . . ." 
And not wishing to remain a moment longer, he went out.-^ 
The Queen's fate was decided, yet an appearance of 
form was necessary and Fouquier-Tinville did not hide the 
fact that he feared an acquittal, so slender were the 
charges. To strengthen the indictment, they applied to 
the Secretary of the ex-commission of the Twenty-and- 
one ; they went back to the grievances formerly brought 
against Toulan, Lepitre and others ; they raked up old 
accusations, old imputations, dating from October 1789, 
or from the journey to Varennes, and as all this still 
formed but a slender charge, Hebert, who, as we have just 
seen, had made himself the impresario of the drama, 
offered to furnish the decisive accusation, the one which, 
in his opinion, ought to secure a verdict.^ He had not 
forgotten the obscene supposition awakened in his las- 
civious mind by the accident which had happened to the 
Dauphin three months before, a supposition, which the 
echo of it having reached the Queen, had caused her to ask 
for a countering attestation from Dr. Pipelet. It was 
this ignoble calumny which, building on the son's testi- 
mony, was to be once more brought against the prisoner. 
This plot fascinated the two masters of the Commune 
all the more because it entered into their plan for isolating 
young Capet. For, whatever might be the effect, they 
could henceforth invoke, in order to keep the child separ- 
ate from his mother, this pretext of "outraged morality." 
We must also point out that when on the point of com- 
mitting this infamous action, Chaumette began by deliver- 
ing before the enraptured General Council a virulent 
speech against bad morals, obscene books and corrupting 

^Francis Drake to Lord Grenville. Historical Manuscripts Commis- 
sion. The MSS. of J. B. Fortesque, Esq., preserved at Dropmore 
Vol. 11, p. 457. 

^Without the revelations of Lord Grenville's secret agent, we should 
be unable to explain the interference of Chaumette and H6bert 
in this affair of the Queen's trial, which was quite foreign to their 
purely municipal rights. 

146 



SIMON 

prints, which he proposed "to have burnt before the statue 
of Brutus,^ by the executioner of Criminal Judgments !" 
And already Simon was preparing his pupil, teaching him 
his lesson. It was necessary, in fact, out of respect for 
probability, to leave the initiative of the confession to 
him. That stands out from the shoemaker^s statement 
that "Citoyen and Citoyenne Simon have learnt certain 
facts from the child's mouth, and that he has often 
pressed them to put him in a position to declare them." ^ 

On the fifteenth day of the first month of the year 11 
(the revolutionary calendar was quite a new fashion), 
that is to say on October 6th, 1790, — formerly Sunday, 
— Chaumette and Hebert arrived at the Temple, bringing 
with them, to add more solemnity and pomp to the oc- 
casion, Mayor Pache and a number of chosen municipal 
representatives, including Antoine Friry, an ex-employe 
in the lottery administration,^ Heusse, a chocolate manu- 
facturer,** Seguy, a doctor,^ and a certain Laurent, who 
belonged to the same section as Simon. ^ The part went 
to the Council room ^ and ascended to Simon's ^ apart- 
ment. The shoemaker had arranged chairs and a table, at 
which citizen Laurent, who was to hold the pen and fill the 
role of clerk of the court, sat down. 

Of the scene which then opened we possess but one 
piece of testimony, that of the report, and decency forbids 
us to quote anything from it. But it is evident that the 

^General Council of the Commune. Sitting of October 1st, 1793. 
Courrier franqais of the 3rd. 

^Examination of Louis Charles of France, October 6th and 7th, 
1793. The original of tliis report is in a glass case in the Museum of 
the National Archives. 

^No. 8 Rue des Vieux Augustin's. Guillaume Tell section. 

*Rue du Bac. Fontaine-Grenelle section. 

^Jean Michel Seguy, Rue Ventadour. Mountain section. 

*Denis-Etienne Laurant, Rue Git-le-Cceur. Marat section. 

'The municipal representatives appointed on the evening of the 
5th to be on guard during the daytime of the 6th were Godart, 
Lorinet, Dupaumier and Lubin. National Archives, F', 4391. 

*The report says: "We ascended to the apartment on the f,rst 
floor occupied by Louis Capet." This is evidently a slip of the pen, 
for the first story was entirely reserved for the guard. 

147 



THE DAUPHIN 

Dauphin had amply profited by Simon's lessons. After 
having denounced his mother's secret meetings with Le- 
pitre, Touban and certain other commissioners, he en- 
tered on the repugnant subject without either embarrass- 
ment or reserve, reciting as one who does not understand 
what he is saying, and who does not hesitate to cross the 
t's and dot the i's. They put no questions to him. He 
spoke fluently, and when it was necessary for him to sign 
his declaration he traced his name, Louis Charles Capet, 
with so clumsy a hand that one would infer from the dis- 
similarity between this illformed signature and the clear 
writing in his exercise books, — dating from the time when 
he did exercises ! — that the unfortunate child was drunk, 
or that they guided his little hand by force. Pache 
signed the ignoble paper, then Chaumette, then Hebert, 
then the others and last of all — respectfully — Simon. 

Tlie next day, October 7th, at one o'clock in the after- 
noon,^ Pache and Chaumette reappeared at the Temple. 
They were going to confront the child with his sister and 
make him repeat before this young girl of fifteen the 
obscenities heard the day before. This time Hebert and 
Friry absented themselves and were replaced by the muni- 
cipal officer Daujon and the painter David, — the great 
David ! — who had nothing to do there but who took ad- 
vantage of his quality as a member of the Committee of 
General Safety to attend a scene which, fond as he was 
of strong emotions, awakened his artistic curiosity. Was 
not the painter formerly found sketching the stiff atti- 
tudes of the victims of the September massacres and a 
few days hence did he not place himself at a window in the 
Rue St. Honore in order to make, as she passed, an 
unforgettable sketch of the Queen as they led her to the 
scaffold? ^ 

* Madame Royale writes "The 8th at noon." 

- It would be highly interesting to know whether David profited by 
his presence in the Temple to draw the Dauphin's silhouette. It is 
very probable he did so. For in the sketch books found in his studio 

148 



SIMON 

As on the preceding day, they entered the Council room, 
where the commissioners then on duty, Daubancourt, 
Eude, Cresson and Seguy, were awaiting them. Only 
the last named was present at the interview, and they 
went first of all to the third floor to fetch Therese Capet. 
Two narratives inform us concerning this second day. 
First of all, there is that of Madame Royale, relating 
with her usual precision how, at the hour when her aunt 
and herself, having finished "doing their room," were 
dressing before dinner, Chaumette and his accomplices 
came at their door. Madame Elizabeth opened it when 
she was dressed and Pache, addressing the King's 
daughter, "begged her to come down.'^ Madame Eliza- 
beth insisted upon accompanying her niece. On her re- 
quest being refused, she asked if the young girl would 
come up again. Chaumette replied : "You can count on the 
word of a good republican ; she will come up again." 
Marie Therese embraced her aunt and left the room, "very 
embarrassed: it was the first time that she found herself 
alone with a dozen men." ^ Chaumette, "in the staircase, 
tried to pay her compliments, but she did not reply to 
them." On reaching the second story, she found herself 
in the presence of her brother, whom she had not seen 
for more than three months. "She embraced him 
tenderly" ; but "Mme. Simon dragged him away," and the 
young princess passed "into the other room." ^ 
Chaumette requested her to sit down, sat down opposite 

at Brussels after his death and which are preserved by his family 
can perhaps be found hidden among other notes, a rough sketch, 
unrecognised owing to absence of date and title, of the scene of 
October 7th. 

^Madame Royale's narrative. This expression "a dozen men" is 
justified if the Municipal representatives on guard in the council 
room ascended as well as Simon to the prisoners' story. Chaumette, 
Pache, David, Daujon, Heusse, Laurent and S^guy who signed the 
report, the three municipal representatives and the shoemaker make 
a total of eleven persons. 

''Probably the former bedroom of Louis XVI which became 
Simon's bedroom. 

149 > 



THE DAUPHIN 

her and, a municipal representative ^ having taken pen 
in hand, began the interrogation : — 

"Your name?" 

"Therese." 

"Speak the truth." 

"Yes, Sir." 

"This concerns neither you nor anybody." 

"It does not concern my mother?" 

"No, but persons who have not done their duty. Do 
you know citizens Toulan, Lepitre, Vincent,^ Bruno,^ 
Beugnot,* Moelle, Michonis and Jobert?" ^ 

And the examination began on the subject of the 
prisoners* conversations with those municipal representa- 
tives. Madame Royale denied everything. "She did not 
know any of those gentlemen ; she was ignorant of every- 
thing that had happened." ® The Dauphin was then 
introduced. They sat him down in an armchair, and 
as "he swung his little legs, which did not reach the 
ground" ^ they called upon him to declare whether he 
persisted in upholding the truth of the wanton scenes 
revealed by him the day before. The unfortunate child 
repeated his accusation. Madame Royale, very con- 
fused,® obstinately denied it. Her brother intervened, 
saying "yes, it is true." They then passed to the sub- 
ject of the journey to Varennes, to Lafayette.® As 

^ Dauj on. 

^ Rene Baptiste Vincent, building contractor, 65 Rue de la Tour- 
nelle. 

^ Jean Bruno or Bruneau, merchant, 30 Rue du Mail. 

* Nicholas Marie Jean Beugniau or Beugnot, architect, 24 Rue 
Houffetard. 

' Augustin-Germain Jobert, merchant, 34 Rue des Pr^cheurs. 

•'Madame Royale. 

' Goret. He gives "word for word," he says, the narrative told 
him by Dauj on. 

' "They questioned me concerning a thousand unpleasant things 
with which they accused my mother. I replied truthfully that it was 
not true but an infamous calumny: . . . they insisted very much." 
(Madame Royale.) 

* "This question relates to a declaration made yesterday by Charles 
(the dauphin) in our presence and which is here explained. — A. That 
she (Madame Royale) saw Lafayette's carriage or at least believed 

150 



SIMON 

Chaumette returned to the question of Lepitre and Toulan 
and the young Princess continued to protest that she 
did not recollect them, the Dauphin vivaciously recalled 
circumstances that she could not have forgotten, to which 
she contented herself by declaring that, *'her brother, 
being cleverer than she was and observing better she 
might have missed what he detected. . . ." ^ Still an- 
other fact reveals the little king's assurance, the stamp 
of the education he was receiving, his unconsciousness. 
It seems that, in the course of the discussion, he took 
the part of his accusers against his own family and those 
who had risked their lives for it. He did not know what 
he was saying; he was proud of the part they made him 
play and, moreover, was perfectly at ease. As they 
were questioning both brother and sister on the subject 
of the architect Renard," Therese upheld that she did 
not know him, but Charles, — the name by which they now 
called him, — looking at her authoritatively, affirmed that 
he knew him, and the sister, submissive, continued that 
"in fact" she did recollect him. That which we are un- 
able to imagine is what was felt by these men, at one and 
the same time actors in and spectators of this odious 
and tragic confrontation. There was not one who rose 
and left the room disgusted; not one who intervened and 
imposed silence on that wretched child, intoxicated with 
words and repeating a lesion he had learnt ; not one who 
warned the brother and sister that a trap was being laid 
for them, that they were being deceived, that they were 

that it was he, because there were two gendarmes in front; at which 
Charles observed that there were torches and that he was frightened. 
— Q. At what hour did they leave the Chateau? Both replied be- 
tween ten and eleven at night, that he was in bed and that they had 
dressed him in girl's clothes when almost asleep; both of them ob- 
serving that this happened in silence. That they descended by the 
back stairs of one of their mother's maids named Rochereuil, and 
she, Therfese, continued to say that the woman Rochereuil did not 
know it." Report. 

^Report. 

^An architect of the Tuileries whom they suspected of having, in 
1791, directed the flight of the royal family. 

151 



THE DAUPHIN 

sending their mother to the scaffold; not one either 
who placed faith in the little prince's statements and who 
did not consent, however, to place his signature at the bot- 
tom of the parricidal report. And of that we are certain, 
since one of tliem, he who held the pen, confessed it with- 
out shame. "I heard this son accuse his mother and 
aunt of . . . ; I heard him and wrote it down . . . and 
I also said : I don't believe a word of it." ^ 

It was over. Daujon read aloud what he had written 
and they signed. Then Madame Royale, approaching 
Chaumette, asked him "with warmth" the favour of 
being re-united with her mother, a favour she had asked, 
she said, more than a thousand times. 

"I can do nothing," replied Chaumette. 

"What, sir! You cannot obtain it from the General 
Council?" 

"I have no authority there." ^ 

The princess was conducted back to the third floor, 
where she embraced her aunt, who immediately, in her 
turn, descended. There was a fresh examination ; a fresh 
confrontation. When Chaumette came to formulate the 
shameful charges, the sister of Louis XVI replied, as 
if nothing coming from these despicable men could aston- 
ish or move her: "that such an infamy was too much 
beneath her to permit her to reply to it. . . ." ^ But 
when she heard her nephew protest that he was not lying 
but telling the truth she could not contain her horror. 
"Oh ! the Monster !" she cried. Nevertheless, either be- 
cause his excitement was on the decline, or because he 
was tired of the sitting, which had lasted nearly four 
hours,^ or else, perhaps, because his audacity was weak- 
ening in Madame Elizabeth's presence, the Dauphin was 
visibly giving way. And here again, it is to Daujon we 
owe the information. Later he communicated to Goret 

^Daujon's narrative. 
- Madame Royale. 
^ Report. 
* Madame Royale. 

152 



SIMON 

that the child's replies had been suggested to him. Every- 
thing showed it : his uneasiness, his bearing. ... I believe 
he said that Madame Elizabeth was not deceived by it, 
but that her exclamation was due to surprise." ^ The 
sister of Louis XVI signed the report "Elizabeth Capet" 
and then rejoined her niece on the third floor, leaving 
her nephew, whom neither one nor the other was ever to 
see again, with the Simons, triumphant over their success. 
Chaumette carried away his report and communicated it 
to Fouquier-Tinville,^ who slashed its pages with pen- 
strokes and wrote in its margins his terrible hie at the 
proper places.^ Three days later, by way of epilogue to 
his recent homily on good morals, Chaumette made the 
general council acquainted with his exploit at the Temple. 
Lepitre, Dange, Leboeuf and other commissioners named 
by the Dauphin were arrested, and the modest Public 
Prosecutor concluded, hiding his face the while by reveal- 
ing the depravities he had been obliged to hear and 
"which he would have liked to have passed over in silence 
for the honour of humanity." ^ 

As to the Dauphin he felt — is there any need to say 
so-f* — ^neither remorse nor scruple. We should have to 
forget his age, — eight years and five months, — to doubt 
his childish innocence, and not to know his impulsive 
and spontaneous nature to place faith for a single mo- 
ment in the touching but inacceptable legend which shows 
him from that day sinking into a state of melancholy and 
consumption, determined to speak not another word be- 
cause they had forced him by blows and drink, threats 
and privations, to give evidence against his mother. 

^ Goret. 

^ "The Public Prosecutor gave a receipt for it to the Mayor of 
Paris." Report. 

^ Fouguier-Tinville, when going through the interrogatories, pointed 
out by this Latin word HIC (here) those passages on which he pro- 
posed to lay stress in his speech for the prosecution. 

* "Chaumette himself was embarrassed when relating them," notes 
the Courrier frangais, in its report of the sitting of the General 
Council on the last day of the second decade of first month, 

153 



THE DAUPHIN 

That story is more touching; but there is neither testi- 
mony nor documentary evidence of any sort to support 
it. Like all children of his age, the Dauphin had a mobile 
and forgetful mind. We have seen him assume an air 
of presumption at the curiosity which he felt was taken 
in him, at the interest which certain people, even the 
most austere, showed in him though it was with rudeness 
and scurrility; yet when he forced himself to merit these 
suffrages unworthy of him the shrewd and mocking nature 
of the descendant of Henry IV sometimes asserted its 
rights. Gagnie, the chef of the kitchens, related later,* 
that one day, in the billiard room, several commissioners 
passed the little prisoner from one to the other, blowing 
puffs of smoke into his face. He took refuge with Gagnie, 
who said to him : "I am sorry to see you in this situation, 
Monsieur Charles**. . . "What! you do not tutoies me?" 
exclaimed the child. "You call me Monsieur? So you 
are not up-to-date? To punish you, drink a glass of 
water." He filled a glass, which Gagnie emptied out of 
complaisance. — "Thank you. Monsieur Charles." — ''Mon- 
sieur again? Oh, I see clearly that you are not up-to- 
date. . . . Drink another glass of water." — "This time," 
protested Gagnie, "I am obliged to you, but I don't 
drink so much water as that !" The young prince roared 
with laughter, finding it comic to reprimand and satiate 
with water for his lukewarmness as a leveller one of those 
men whose taste for civic elocution and less anodyne 
drinks he had noticed. The scene must have taken place 
in the middle of October, 1793, if it is correct, as Gagnie 
reports, that it resulted in the removal of the billiard 

^Without rejecting those narratives dating from the period of the 
Restoration, when the former employes at the Temple were seek- 
ing to show the devotion which they then regretted they had not more 
e&caciously shown to the imprisoned family, we cannot, in the main, 
accept them as true. An exception is here made in the case of 
Gagnie's account because a police-note reports this personage, living 
at 9, Rue du Foubourg St. Martin, as having supplied a number of 
details to Simien Despreaux for his Histoire de Louis XVII, where 
this anecdote appears. — National Archives, F', 6008, file 14:96. 

154i 



SIMON 

table. The order to suppress it was, in fact, given on the 
25th of Vendemiaire, year 11.^ The juxtaposition of 
this date with the words "the young prince roared with 
laughter" is painful, for the 25th of Vendemiaire was 
October 16th. Perhaps, whilst the well-beloved child of 
Marie Antoinette was thus making merry with his jailors, 
the Queen, about to die, was writing that heart-rending 
farewell which the arrival of the executioner interrupted, 
perhaps Simon's cart was already carrying her through 
the streets of Paris. They knew it, those men; it is not 
possible they were not thinking of it, and yet they ex- 
cited that childish laughter; they dared to face that 
innocent look. . . . What men and what a time they 
lived in! 



With the Queen disappeared the principal obstacle to 
the sequestration and eventual abduction of the Dauphin. 
Those who sacrificed the mother were also those who 
planned to take possession of the son and nobody, we 
must recognise, was better placed to attain that object 
than Chaumette, who reigned over the Temple as if it 
were a conquered country. Behold him rid also of the 
Lepitres, the Leboeufs and other colleagues of the Com- 
mune, guilty not so much for having shown themselves 
compassionate as for displaying attentive zeal to the 
prisoner, threatening the success of the plan he had con- 
ceived. He was not going to let others deprive him of 
the benefit on which he counted. Of his plot there exists, 
let us repeat, no written or tangible proof; but it is 
self-evident both from the man's duplicity and the suc- 
cession of measures which he ordered. Thus, on October 
19th, there appeared before the Revolutionary tribunal 
those municipal representatives whom it was urgent to 
remove from the Temple : Dange, Leboeuf , Lepitre, Vincent, 
Bugneau, Moelle, Michonis and Jobert. They wanted to 

^ Reports of the Commune. Revue retrospective, 2nd series. Vol. IX. 

155 



THE DAUPHIN 

get rid of them and secure a motive for forbidding them, 
for a certain time at least, to enter the rojal prison; 
but it was also necessary not to make a great stir over 
their trial, so as not to draw attention to the Temple. 
As to Toulan, the most compromised one of all and whom 
they would have had a difficulty in saving, they had 
facilitated his flight.^ Cortey, who had introduced Baron 
de Batz into the Temple, was not troubled; he stiU com- 
manded his company in the National Guards. Behold 
the others before the court, accused of having plotted 
the escape of the royal family. The charge was all the 
more serious because the Commune had entrusted them 
with the custody of the prisoners. Their condemnation 
was therefore certain, so anticipated that, on the very 
morning of the trial Madame Lepitre, having come to her 
section to ask for an authorisation to enter the Con- 
ciergerie to see her husband, heard a secretary growl: 
"Her husband.'' he is now on the scaffold!"^ Not so! 
Fouquier-Tinville had received orders ; he had been 
strongly advised to be prudent ; he had been forbid- 
den to speak of the Temple. "Suppress the details of 
the plan which Simon frustrated . . . details to be 
omitted so as not to suggest such means 'publicly." And 
when he was about to risk, in his speech for the 
prosecution, an allusion to deputy Chabot, to whom the 
Marquise de Jeanson had offered a million if he succeeded 
in saving the Queen, there was a fresh comminatory in- 
junction "not to speak of the woman Jeanson who 
had won over Chabot." ^ That is why, when Leboeuf, 
Michonis and their colleagues appeared before the im- 
placable tribunal, their judgment was a comedy. Lepitre, 
who, however, had received a hundred thousand livres 
from Jarjayes, "underwent an examination which sur- 
prised him by the little importance they appeared to 

^ "As I have learnt since, they facilitated Toulan's means of flight." 
Lepitre, p. 67. 
^ I^epitre, p. 75. 
^National Archives, W. 389. See Lecestre, loc. cit. 

156 



SIMON 

attach to it." ^ Tison, who was the first to denounce the 
guilty ones, was not called upon to give evidence. Not a 
single member of the Commune bore witness against them. 
Fouquier-Tinville became indifferent to the cast and 
let it be conducted by one of his deputies. Even the 
Bulletin du Tribunal passed the proceedings over in 
silence.^ All the accused were acquitted and embraced 
by both judges and jurymen, with the exception of 
Michonis whom they kept in prison.^ 

Meanwhile, the clearing of the Temple was actively 
continued. It was Hebert who directed that work, for 
his accomplice Chaumette had gone to Nevers to rest in 
the bosom of his family. As a pretext had to be found, 
they seized hold of the sordid one of economy: the five 
hundred thousand livres granted by the Legislature As- 
sembly for the prisoners' maintenance were exhausted and 
the expenses were going to be chargeable to the budget 
of the Commune.* On September 14th they took away 
from Madame Elizabeth and Madame Royale the two 
,»ilver spoons they used, their china sugar-basin and other 
articles considered to be too elegant. Tison was with- 
drawn from them. Since being alone to serve them, he 
was suspected of having allowed himself to come under 
their influence. But this accusation was too vague; to 
be more correct it was not even formulated,^ and the Com- 
mune, docilely, without asking for a word of explanation, 
allowed Tison to remain, henceforth a captive in the little 
tower, in close custody, without Chaumette and Hebert, 
whose interest it was to conjure him away, feigning to 
state what his crime was and what fault this prisoner 
of their good pleasure expiated. Mathey, the door- 
keeper steward, and the hair-dresser Danjou were set 

^Lepttre, p. Q5. 

- Bulletin du Tribunal Criminel Revolutiomiaire, 2nd part, No. 96. 
^ Bulletin and Lecestre, loc. cit. 
* Temple papers XLVII. 

^ General Council of the Commune. Sitting of September 24th, 1793. 
Courrier franqais of the 25th. 

157 



THE DAUPHIN 

aside in the same manner.^ Manifestly they sought to 
turn out all those who, attached to prison duties since 
the beginning of the captivity, had seen the Dauphin 
growing up for more than a year. On October 1st this 
measure of reform at the Temple was concluded. And 
instead of thirty employees there were now no more than 
fourteen. Le Baron, the turnkey, Remy, the pantry- 
man and his colleague Mafon, Manduit, the treasurer, 
and the wood-carriers were expelled. Cailleux, the ad- 
ministrator was "absent." ^ A few days later it was 
decided that "the use of pastry and poultry be sup- 
pressed," the prisoners having no more for their dinner 
"than a single soup, boiled beef, some other dish and a 
bottle of wine a day." Simon, his wife and "the child 
entrusted to them" were to be fed like the commissioners : 
at dinner time, soup, boiled beef, a roast, two entremets 
and two desserts,^ wliich allowed the dismissal of the 
three waiters who had been there since August 13th, 
1792. And thus it was that Turgy took up the prisoners' 
dinner for the last time. Forbidden to lay the table, 
he placed before each of the princesses a piece of beef, 
a loaf of bread, a pewter spoon and an iron fork. The 
next day, at six in the morning he received an order to 
leave the Temple immediately.* Whatever they may have 
said, the motive for these expulsions was not economy, 
since a few days later the three dismissed waiters were 
replaced by a similar number of servants : Car on, Ler- 
mouzeau and Vandebourg. A new steward was chosen 
named Corn, a cooper and member of the Commune, to 
whom they attributed a salary of four thousand livres.^ 
If they did not get rid of Gagnie, the head of the kitchens, 
it was because he had consented to make big advances 

'^National Archives, W. A. 81. 

^ General Council of the Commune. Sitting of October 1st, 1793. 
Courtier frangais of the 3rd. 

' General Council of the Commune. Sitting of the 8th day of the 
2nd decade of the first month (October 9th). 

* Turgy, retired to Tournan-en-Brie. 

' General Council of the Commune. Sitting of October 9th. 

158 




-f -^ 



v3 V. ^-r^ O '.- 

r 



J f /-%■>. K. I -a."!. Q 4- ■'■ ' *- 



PORTRAIT OF SIMON 
Original sketch. Private collection 



SIMON 

to tradespeople and they did not know how to re-imburse 
him. 

And what about Simon? Now that his part was 
played, they pushed him outside. At the beginning of 
December, in his more ardent than prudent zeal, he had 
attempted to repeat the exploit which had brought him so 
much praise at the time of the Dauphin's examination. 
This time, either because nobody inspired him or because 
his mischievous pupil had taken advantage of his sim- 
plicity, he acted in the light of day, for had he not the 
stupidity to send a report to the General Council attest- 
ing that "Charles Capet was worrying himself" on the 
subject "of important facts concerning the safety of the 
republic." The boy said he heard on the women's floor, 
between six and nine o'clock, blows struck regularly, fol- 
lowed by steps. It would not astonish him if the 
prisoners were hiding false assignats, of their own fabri- 
cation perhaps, which they would then pass through the 
window "to communicate them to someone. . . ." As to 
Simon, he had heard nothing, "being somewhat hard of 
hearing"; but "his wife has confirmed Charles Capet's 
statements. . . ." This mystification, read to the General 
Council, had no success. A few members, frequenters of 
the Temple, expressed the hypothesis that these noises 
"were caused by the wood which the prisoners were ar- 
ranging, by the fagots they were making and unmak- 
ing." ^ In reality what they heard was the noise of the 
palets which the two princesses moved in the course of 
their daily game of backgammon.^ This stupid blunder 
did not increase the shoemaker's prestige. As Chaumette 
no longer protected him, the Council showed him no con- 
sideration. He was now permitted to descend to the 
garden only under the constant supervision of one of 
his colleagues.^ Shortly afterwards the card permitting 

1 General Council of the Commune. Sitting of the 14th of Frimaire 
(December 4th). Courrier republicain of the 16th. 
^ Madame Royale. 
^National Archives, A. A. 53, 1486. 

159 



THE DAUPHIN 

him to go about outside the Temple and return there 
of his own free will was refused him. One day, when he 
expressed a wish to go as far as his house to fetch some 
things, they authorised him to do so but only on condition 
that he was accompanied by two commissioners. And 
when, on December 27th, he begged the favour of being 
allowed to attend the fete to be celebrated on the occa- 
sion of the taking of Toulan, they refused him. He was 
henceforth a prisoner of his duties, on which, however, 
he kept a tight hold, because they were lucrative. He 
was "royally" lodged, well fed, warmed, lighted, laundered 
and had a salary of nine thousand livres! Never would 
the couple again enjoy such opulence. 

And perhaps, also, he was genuinely attached to the 
disciple whose mind he imagined he had opened to new 
ideas. Is it admissible, in fact, that these two old people 
were not overcome with tenderness for this child, so en- 
gaging through his misfortune and gracefulness, so full 
of life also, who laughed at every excuse and sang the 
whole day like the birds in his aviary .^^ It is true the 
shoemaker was abrupt, cursed and swore, distributed at 
times cuffs and blows, did not refuse himself the 
pleasure of having his slippers or his hot water brought 
to him by the King of France, — it was so tempting! but 
we know that "he was not devoid of sensibility" and was 
easily moved to pity. As regards the woman Simon, 
who had never been a mother, we should have to suppose 
she was dissimilar to all women to believe that she did 
not love — in her own way — that little Capet whose con- 
tinued presence distracted, cheered and flattered her. 
Even admitting that the shoemaker was a monster and his 
wife a shrew, they would still have had to be phenomena 
of those sorts to have undertaken, as had been said, the 
slow assassination of that orphan who might to-morrow 
be their King, and they would have been the only ones 
who did not understand that their interest lay in hus- 

160 



SIMON 

banding, for the uncertain future, if not his gratitude 
at least liis indulgence. 

As to Chaumette — the one who did foresee it — he felt 
himself from day to day surrounded in a blind alley; he 
had set the wild beasts at liberty and was powerless to 
chain them up again. Since his return from Nevers, he 
was walking to the abyss. He sought to throw, as food 
to the pack which pressed him, everything which the great 
city of Paris had venerated for centuries. He installed 
a ballet-dancer of the Opera on the altar of Notre-Dame 
and received at the Hotel de Ville the profaned reliquary 
of Saint Genevieve.-^ The sittings of the Commune were 
transformed into sacrilegious jokes. He "baptised" 
there a twelve-year-old American slave, on whose head, 
after the manner of private baptism, he placed his tri- 
colour scarf,^ and, under his inspiration, the General 
Council losing even its sense of the ridiculous, charged 
Dorat-Cubieres, its secretary, and Charles Villette, in-- 
terpreter of the Commune, "to convert the Pope and 
Cardinals by translating, for that purpose, into the 
Italian language all the reports which established the 
abjuration of priests, in order to send these documents 
to His Holiness and to Their Eminences." ^ Notwith- 
standing these attempts to outbid his opponents, he knew 
that he was being watched. At the Convention and on 
the Committee of Public Safety, after having trembled 
before him, they despised, hated him, feared him no more. 
Terrible and still hidden rancour rose like a threatening 
flood. Time was pressing Chaumette and Hebert if they 
considered the child of the Temple as a safeguard, to aim 
themselves against their adversaries with that talisman 
of which they alone disposed and which so many parties 
secretly coveted. 

^General Council of the Commune, 1st of Frimaire. Courrier r4- 
publicain of the 3rd. 

^General Council of the Commune. Sitting of June 13th, 1793. 
Courrier frangais of the 15th. 

'General Council of the Commune. Sitting of the 19th of Bru- 
maire. Courrier republicain of the 21st. 

161 



ENIGMAS 

At the very hour that Chaumette's credit was giving 
way, a radical and unexpected change suddenly trans- 
formed the whole system of inspection at the Temple. 
On January 3rd, 1794, at the sitting of the General 
Council, the calling over of the names of members having 
shown the absence of a large number of representatives, 
"occupied in various administrations," Pache, the Mayor, 
hinted that no municipal representative ought to accept 
duties which would prevent him attending the meetings of 
the Council. Chaumette ^ seized this opportunity, which 
he had perhaps inspired, to make a hostile attack against 
the incompatibility of occupations. He quoted Robes- 
pierre, on whom he now fawned on every occasion recall- 
ing the "Incorruptible's" words : "If you grant two 
positions to a man, give him two bodies." Whereupon he 
transformed the citizen Mayor's observation into a 
proposition and it was decreed that "any member of the 
municipal council having a duty or an occupation which 
obliged him to absent himself during Assembly hours 
would be expected to make a choice." " Coru immediately 
declared that he would give up his post as steward of 
the Temple.^ The Council filled with ecstasy at the sight 
of one of its members sacrificing a salary of four thou- 
sand livres for the only compensation of coming every 

^For some time past he bore the title of National Agent. Sitting 
of the General Council of the 1st of Nivose. Courrier republicain 
of the 3rd. 

^General Council of the Commune. Sitting of the 14th of Nivose. 
(January 3rd). Moniteur of the 17th. 

^Courrier reptiblicain of the 16th of Nivose. 

162 



ENIGMAS 

evening to hear Chaumette hold forth, decided that men- 
tion be made of this act of disinterestedness and, — a some- 
what inexpHcable contradiction, — that his imitators "be 
inscribed on the Hst of candidates chosen to act as com- 
missioners appointed by the Commune." ^ Then the ques- 
tion of Simon came up. Langlois " pointed out that 
"Simon occupied a confidential post, and it was desirable 
he should retain it" ; ^ but the council "passed to the order 
of the day stated by the law." 

The result was that the shoemaker was obliged to come 
to a decision. Under pain of being classed in public 
opinion among the "profiteers," it was necessary for him 
to relinquish his Temple stipend. Hesitating but little, 
he appeared two days later at the Council, for the first 
time for six months, to announce that he abandoned his 
mission as an educator in order to retain that granted 
him by the confidence of the electors. Several spoke in 
the same vein, amongst others Veron, police officer, and 
Legrand, who resigned his office as registrar; but where 
the mystery begins is when we see the General Council, 
touched by these fine deeds, appointing on the spot 
the said Veron to the post of registrar which the said 
Legrand had just abandoned in order not to hold a 
plurality of offices. Corn was also provided for the same 
night, as well as Bergot * and Deltroit,^ all three being 
promoted to posts in the registrar's office.^ But Simon 
remained without either situation or compensation, either 
because his colleagues did not consider him capable of 
doing anything else but forming the intelligence and the 
heart of the son of kings, or because this comedy of a 

^Courrier republicain of the 16th of Nivose. 

^Marie Frangais Langlois, stationer, 196 Rue St. Jacques. Former 
Beaurepaire section, reformed. 

^Courrier republicain of the 16th of Nivose. 

^Jean Baptiste Bergot, employe at the leather market, Rue Fran- 
9aise. Bon Conseil section. 

^Claude Antoine Deltroit, ex-haberdasher, Rue des Fosses-Saint 
Germain I'Auxerrois. Museum section. 

^General Council of the Commune. Sitting of the 21st of Nivose. 
(January 5th, 1794). Courrier republicain of the 18th. 

163 



THE DAUPHIN 

plurality of offices had merely been imagined to get rid 
of him, or to justify his departure from the Temple. It 
is certain that Chaumette and Hebert saw him disappear 
with satisfaction, since they did not utter in his favour a 
single word which might have been decisive. As a matter 
of form, they consulted, on the subject of Simon's re- 
placement, the Committee of General Safety, which de- 
clared that it took no further interest in the matter, 
whereupon the Commune postponed for three days the 
choice of a successor, decreeing "that a list of candidates 
should be drawn up with that object in view." ^ But if 
this list was made it was never consulted. Nine days 
later it transpired that Simon had left the Temple and 
would not be replaced. Four members of the Commune, 
renewed daily, were to look after the safe keeping of the 
child. 

Meanwhile Simon, up to then so submissive, displayed 
his discontent without moderation. Was he sincere in 
his recriminations or was he playing an ordered comedy.'' 
His conduct during those early days of January was 
strange. It has been said " that, furious at what had 
happened at the sitting of the 5th, he refused to reappear 
at the tower and sent a turnkey to his wife "to order 
her to pack up and come down as soon as possible." 
But, soon repenting of his precipitation, he asked for an 
authorisation to remain in the Temple enclosure, where, 
"above the stables," he and his wife put up. "They were 
even fed at the expense of the house." However, after 
ten days, the steward, having complained of this increase 
of expense, the Simons re-ascended, on January 19th, to 
their second floor of the tower in order to hand over young 
Capet to the Commissioners on duty and obtain a regular 
release from them. After which, "restored to liberty, they 

^ General Council of the Commune. Sitting of the 21st of Nivose 
(January 10th). Moniteur of the 24th and Courrier republicain 
of the 23rd. 

^By Chantelauze, who does not give any reference. Doubtless he 
borrowed it from Eckart or Simien-Despreaux. 

164 



ENIGMAS 

left the tower the same day." ^ If the incidents followed 
each other in that order the Dauphin must have re- 
mained without a guardian and the Simons without a 
release for twelve to fourteen days. Was that what they 
wanted and did Simon, feigning vexation, obey orders 
he had received? Can we admit that, even under the 
impulse of anger, he abandoned the child entrusted to 
him without covering his responsibility by a receipt in 
order? If his hasty temper and stupidity blinded him 
to the consequences of such an imprudence, was it on 
the other hand probable that the Commissioners com- 
posing the council of the Temple would not have im- 
mediately reported it to the Commune in order that it 
should assure the supervision of little Capet? 

It is most regrettable that the numerous historians 
who, for more than a century, studied the sad life of 
Louis XVII, have all of them narrated it with an undis- 
guised foregone conclusion, their object being "to prove 
something," either an escape or death in the Temple, or 
the survival of the prince in such or such of the "pretended 
Dauphins." Among the accessible documents, they 
selected only those advantageous to their thesis; and 
that is why so much of the information amassed in the 
Archives of the Commune, now no longer in existence, 
and where in all probability the solution of the enigma 
of Simon's departure was to be found, remained for the 
most part unutilised. At the present time, to put into 
practice the wise old adage ad narramdum, Twn ad pro- 
handum, we find ourselves singularly destitute. All that 
one can state is that the Dauphin and his teacher left 
each other "good friends." One evening, — evidently be- 
tween the 5th and 19th of January, 1794, — Simon had 
gone to the Cafe Desnoyers, in the Rue des Filles- 
Dieu to find Hebert,^ who lived quite near, and the 

^Chantelauze. Louis XVII, Son Enfance, sa prison et sa mort 
au Temple, pp. 232-233. 
^Cour des Forges. 

1^5 



THE DAUPHIN 

municipal representative Jault ^ and Lasnier," as well as 
two other frequenters of the place, who are indicated 
merely by initials.^ Simon spoke of little Capet and, 
"with tears in his eyes," repeated a remark made by the 
child the night before. "Simon, my dear Simon," he 
said, "take me to your shop. You can teach me to make 
shoes and I will pass as your son, for I foresee they wiU 
spare me no more than they did my father." — "I would 
give an arm," added Simon, "for this child to belong 
to me, so lovable is he and so attached am I to him." ^ 
It is also established that the Simon household, excluded 
from the Royal prison, decided to live in the immediate 
neighbourhood of the tower. We possess, indeed, a pre- 
cise indication of the lodgings which the shoemaker and 
his wife rented "in a building looking on to the courtyard 
of the stables," a courtyard which was separated from 
the garden of the tower merely by a door, of which 
Picquet was the janitor. The Simons had two rooms and 
a kitchen ^ there ; but what is astonishing is that, at the 
same time, they secured a second establishment at the other 
end of Paris in their old street. Rue Marat. There they 

* Pierre Simeon Joseph Sault, artist, Rue de I'Egalite, Boune Nou- 
velle section. 

- Jacques Lasnier, rent collector, Rue du Four, Saint Germaine. 
Muscius Scaevola (Luxembourg) section. 
^ G. de M. and T. M. 

* Le regne de Louis XVII contenant des ditails stir la regence de 
Monsieur by an ex-professor of history at the Royal University 
of Paris, 1817. Usually nothing is more suspicious than this sort 
of anecdote. It is quite certain that the correct words put into 
Simon's mouth do not resemble the shoe-maker's ordinary language, 
but, if we are willing to take merely their sense, this testimony pre- 
sents every guarantee. The "ex-professor of history" to whom we 
owe it was, according to Barbier, Antoine Serieys, who lectured in 
history in Paris during the Terror. Successively librarian of the 
Prytanee fran^ais, proctor at the Lyc^e of Cahors and then pro- 
fessor at the Academic of Douai, he has left numerous works of 
conscientious erudition. Now, he declares that he received the above 
remarks from one of the ear-witnesses, M. T. M., who put it down 
in writing and communicated it to Serieys, guaranteeing its "incon- 
testable authenticity." Let us furthermore observe that it was nec- 
essary to be very sure of that authenticity to risk publishing the 
anecdote in 1817, when it was in perilous contradiction with every- 
thing which was then printed concerning Simon and Louis XVII. 

^National Archives, F\ 4775, 19. 

166 



ENIGMAS 

rented, in the former Convent of the Franciscans, two 
bedrooms with fireplaces and alcoves, looking out on to 
the quincunxes of the garden. They paid the Department, 
the owner of the building, sixty francs per annum ; ^ and 
we remain somewhat puzzled by this double establishment, 
in quarters so distant one from the other for poor 
wretches whose entire furniture was worth only seventy 
livres.^ 

We are also quite certain regarding the date of their 
definite departure from the Tower of the Temple, viz. : 
January 19th, 1794, a Sunday, or in the new style the De- 
cadi, 30th of Nivose, year II. The four commissioners on 
duty that day were Cochefer,^ Lasnier, Lorinet ^ and Le- 
grand.^ Appointed on the previous evening, they had 
spent the night of the 18th to the 19th at the Temple, then 
the whole day of the 19th, when, at nine at night,^ Simon 
informed them he was about to leave and requested them 
to ascend, in order that they might give him a release from 
the person of Charles Capet.^ The formality accom- 

^Antoine Simon's papers. National Archives, T. 905. — "Fourteenth 
of Messidor, year II (July 2nd, 1794), received from citizen Simon 
for six months in advance and to be deducted from the six last 
months of occupation, thirty livres." — Six months elapsing on July 
2nd places the taking of possession in January, 1794. Other papers 
which belonged to Simon are to be found in the Archives of the De- 
partment of the Seine. — State property Department 126. We find 
that he bought shares in the La Farge Tontine: he possessed four of 
ninety livres each, and had placed them "on the head of his wife, 
of his brother Louis Simon, of Fran^aise Jacqueline Aladame, his 
sister-in-law and on his own." Of the 4500 livres which he had 
received during the six months of his sojourn at the Temple, Simon 
doubtless employed the greater part in paying his debts, for in July, 
1794, he had nothing else save these four shares in the Tontine. 

-National Archives, F% 6606, 1366. 

^ Christophe Cochefer, ex-upholsterer, 78 Rue Saint Merry. Re- 
union section. 

* Bernard Nicolas Lorinet, doctor, 26 Rue des Carmes, Pantheon 
section. 

^ Pierre Jacques Legrand, lawyer. Rue d'Enfer. Cit6 section. 

^National Archives, F', 4391. 

''Municipality of Paris, 30th of Nivose, year II. Temple Council. 
Extract from the registers of the Temple Council of the 30th of 
Nivose 2nd year of the French Republic, one and indivisible, on 
the said day, at nine at night, Simon and his wife, formerly en- 
trusted with the custody of Charles Capet, having requested us un- 

167 



THE DAUPHIN 

plished, the Simons left in the dead of a foggy night. 
Was the child sleeping? Probably so, for we have seen 
it was usual for him to have supper early and be in bed 
by nine o'clock. Who remained with him that night.? 
Who took care of him the next day when he awoke .f* We 
cannot say. From that moment the history of the cap- 
tive Dauphin is finished. Nobody during six months would 
say they had seen him ; nobody would speak any more 
of him; never at the Commune, which up to the present 
had occupied itself almost daily with the prisoners of 
the Temple, never more would his name be mentioned. 
The accountant's office itself was silent on this subject.^ 
His sister and aunt no longer heard him singing and 
laughing. Only, the young princess wrote later, "on 
January 19th we heard a great noise at my brother's, 
which made us conjecture that he was leaving the Temple, 
and we were convinced of it, when, looking through a hole 
in our sun-blind, we saw many packages being taken 
away. On the following days we heard his door open and, 
still convinced that he was gone, we believed they had 
put below some German or foreign prisoner, whom we 
baptised Melchisedec to give him a name." ^ So there 
was still a child on the second floor of the Tower, a sin- 
gularly silent and quiet child, as we see from that extract 
from Madame Royale's journal; but was it the Dauphin.? 
— was it a child who had been substituted for him.? — That 

dersigned members of the Commune at the Temple to-day, to ascend 
to the room of the said Charles Capet, we proceeded there. He 
exhibited to us the person of the said Capet, prisoner, being in 
good health, asking us kindly to take charge of the said Capet and 
grant him a provisional release until the Council had granted a defi- 
nite release from the said supervision which ended to-day, which 
provisional release we have granted; and we have taken over the 
custody of the said Capet. Signed: Legrand, Lasnier Coehefer, 
Lorinet. (Seal of the Temple Council in red wax.) The late 
Georges Cain's collection of autographs. 

*0n the 22nd of Nivose (January 11th) a decree of the General 
Council placed the Temple administration under the cognizance of 
the Department of Public Establishments. This Department settled 
the arrears of Cailleux and those of Coru. Temple Papers, XLIX. 

^Madame Royale. 

168 



ENIGMAS 

is a question which the rare circumstances knoA^n of the 
radical change made during those days to the instruc- 
tions and regulations of the Temple help us little to 
elucidate. 

We notice, however, that, on the night of January 
19th, contrary to very regularly established usage, no 
commissioner was appointed by the General Council to 
go to the Temple to relieve Legrand, Lasnier, Cochefer 
and Lorinet ^ after their twenty-four hours' duty. They 
therefore doubled it and remained until the night of the 
next day. Not until the 1st of Pluviose did their four 
substitutes arrive, namely, — Minier, Menessier, Mouret 
and Michee, who were themselves relieved the following 
day, the 2nd of Pluviose, by Mercier, Marcel, Warme and 
Bigot. Now, the presence of the last two is surprising: 
first of all, because their names interrupt in an unusual 
manner the alphabetic order habitually followed when 
choosing the Temple commissioners ; secondly, because 
neither Warme nor Bigot appear on the various lists of 
members of the Commune. Can we imagine Marcel and 
Mercier's astonishment, — the latter elected by the Finis- 
tere section, the other by that of the Fauborg du Nord, 
— on seeing themselves joined for a mission so full of re- 
sponsibility, reserved up to then to members only of the 
General Council, by two men who had no title to share it ? ^ 

* At least the authority of the 30th of Nivose is missing from the 
series in the Archives. F% 4391. 

^ Warme and Bigot appear neither in the very complete list of 
members of the Commune of August 10th given by Braesch, nor in 
that of the Almanack National of 1793, nor in that of 1794, nor again 
in that, erroneous in certain points, but precious inasmuch as it in- 
dicates the substitutes, published by Lebas in his Dictionnaire pit- 
toresque de la France. Hov/ever, the Moniteur mentions Warme 
as "a member of the Commune" in March, 1794, and guillotined as 
such with Robespierre. Reprint, Vol. XIX, p. 645; Vol. XXI, p. 160, 
The Liste General et tr^s exacte ... of the conspirators mentions 
him thus: "Jacques Louis Frederic Wouarme (is this the correct 
orthography of the name?), twenty-nine years, ex-clerk at the State 
Property Department, then, employe on the Commission of Com- 
merce and provisions." In May, 1793, Warme (sic) signs as presi- 
dent of the Theatre Fran^ais section {Tuetdy's Repertoire, Vol. 
VIII, Np. ?555.) This was Chaumette and Simon's section. In 

169 



THE DAUPHIN 

Why did they accept their help? How is it they did not 
protest? Because their task was a particularly painful 
one. The date was January 21st and it was on that day 
that the unfortunate prisoner was to be walled up. 

Was he walled up? That is a tradition so firmly estab- 
lished on a number of very touching narratives that it is 
to-day promoted to the rank of an historical truth; but 
had it not precisely its origin in the absolute penury of 
information concerning the life of the little captive for 
the period which stretches from Simon's departure to 
the 9th of Thermidor, — a period of six months? Have 
not historians of Louis XVH, embarrassed by this lack 
of testimony, rashly concluded there was complete iso- 
lation, the only apparently logical way of explaining the 
inevitable gaps in their documentation? But that is ex- 
plaining the incomprehensible by the improbable, for 
how can we bring ourselves to believe that they shut 
up alone, in a room the door of which was fastened "with 
nails and screws," a child of under nine, in such a manner 
that they could not immediately succour him in the case 
of urgency, nor even ascertain his state of health? Can 
anyone suppose that the Dauphin, accustomed only the 
day before to be served, would know how, reduced to his 
own little strength, to wash himself, dress his hair, brush 
his clothes, make his bed, turn his mattresses, wax the 
floor of his room and open the window, the fastening of 
which was out of his reach? Did they supply him, in 
his impenetrable prison, with brushes, brooms, dusters, 
jugs and all the other things indispensable for the Robin- 

the Commune of August 10th we find a Bigaut, Jean Baptiste, — and 
in that of July, 1793, a second Biguad, distinct from the first 
(Braesch, p. 247) ; but we are dealing here neither with one nor with 
the other: the authority of the commissioners of the Temple of the 
2nd of Pluviose gives the name Bigot, first of all written Bigaut, 
but afterwards altered in such a way as to state precisely it is 
BIGOT. National Archives F', 4391. This Bigot, whose Christian 
name was R^my, and who we shall see appear later at the Temple, 
ended as an employ^ at the Prefecture of Police. 

170 



ENIGMAS 

son Crusoe he was to become? That is what his biog- 
raphers ought to have told us instead of analysing his 
solitary thoughts, depicting his wild despair and revealing 
to us, with a disquieting minuteness of detail, his long 
decline towards consumption and premature decay. To 
condemn a child of that age to complete isolation was at 
the same time to condemn him to filth and vermin. . . . 
And who took upon himself to give such an order? 
Neither trace nor mention of it do we find anywhere. 
Nobody has ever discovered a text or even a single line 
of writing which seems to have reference to it. It may 
be said that Hebert and Chaumette were men who would 
not have hesitated to have recourse to such cruelty if 
they had considered it to be in their interest; but they 
would have had to have had as accomplices a hundred and 
forty-four members of the Commune who were chosen in 
alphabetical order every night, four by four, to assure 
the supervision of the Temple, and also the officers and 
non-commissioned officers of the National Guard, in in- 
calculable numbers, who every day went on duty at the 
prison. Now, among these men, so varied in class and 
education, if there were bad, indifferent and pusillanimous 
ones, all, once more, were not torturers. Many of them 
had children ; several had become attached to little Capet 
in Simon's time, when they amused themselves with him 
in the billiard-room; a few of them even had proved 
themselves sufficiently courageous to show compromising 
attentions to the royal family. Dange, Jobert and Vin- 
cent had come before the Tribunal charged with that 
crime. They returned to the Temple during the child's 
sequestration;^ they re-appeared there, not as simple 
superintendents, but as responsible guardians ; and yet 
not one of them protested against the unworthy treatment 

^Dange, the 17th of Pluviose (February 5th), and the 16th of 
Ventose (March 6th).— Jobert, 9th of Floreal (April 28th), the 11th of 
Prairial (May 30th) and the 18th of Messidor, (July 6th).— Vincent, 
the 8th of Ventose (February 26th)— 3rd of Floreal (April 22nd,— 
the 16th of Floreal (May 5th). 

171 



THE DAUPHIN 

inflicted on this poor innocent boy. Berthelin,^ ex- 
cluded from the Council in September because they ac- 
cused him of excessive weakness and of having too re- 
spectful an air when on duty at the Temple,^ then 
reinstated at the request of Chaumette himself who 
vouched for his patriotism, — Berthelin was on duty on 
January 28th by the side of the little prince, encaged like 
a dangerous beast, and yet was not filled with indignation ! 
And then there was Paffe,^ — "honest Monsieur Paffe" as 
the Queen called him, or as Lepitre wrote, "a fine fellow," 
who had formerly placed himself in danger by supplying 
the prisoners with wool, knitting needles and other articles 
forbidden by the Commune, — would he have been able to 
support, on six occasions,* the spectacle of the loathsome 
martyr without having the courage to raise his voice in 
the name of humanity? Again there was the Mason 
Barelle ^ who, when the son of Louis XVI was the shoe- 
maker Simon's pupil, had shown himself so affectionate 
that the Dauphin called him, it is said,^ "his good friend," 
— Barelle, who many times had been seen amusing the 
little prisoner, must have been broken-hearted at the 
noxious odour of the filthy hole where the child was 
implacably confined, and of whom he could catch but a 
glimpse through a latticed wicketJ And what about 
Simon, who, from January to the end of May, 1794, re- 

^Jean Baptiste Berthelin, ex-upholsterer, 339 Rue des Moineaux. 

-General Council of the Commune. Sitting of September 7th, 1793. 
Courrier frangais of the 9th. 

^Fran9ois Auguste Patfe, hosier. Rue de la Joaillerie. Arcis 
section. 

*The third of Pluviose (January 23nd)— the 2nd of Ventose (Feb- 
ruary 20th)— the 1st of Germinal (March 21st)— the 27th of Ger- 
minal (April 16th)— 22nd of Floreal (May 11th)— and the 4th of 
Thermidor (July 22nd). 

■^Jean Guillaume Barelle, mason. Rue du Faubourg Saint Denis. 
At the Sign of the Crowbar. 

"Beauchesne. Louis XVII, sa vie, son agonie, sa mort, Vol. XI, 
p. 153. 

'Barelle was on duty at the Temple on the 11th of Pluviose 
(January 30th)— 2nd of Ventose (February 20th) — 9th of Germinal 
(March 29th)— 6th of Floreal (April 25th)— 1st of Prairail (May 
20th)— 8th of Messidor (June 26th). 

172 



ENIGMAS 

appeared five times at the prison where, for a time, he 
had laid down the law? Can one admit that he hid his 
presence from his former pupil, that he said not a word to 
him, that he did not express, at the least, astonishment, 
if not indignation at the wretched condition in which he 
found his little Charles, formerly so lively and so vig- 
orous? ^ The silence of so many commissioners consent- 
ing to participate in the atrocious and slow torture of a 
child in whom they had many times shown interest, is 
surely a convincing proof that the confinement of the 
prisoner in the Temple was not as it has been described 
to us so often. — It may be objected that these municipal 
representatives were frightened; that they feared their 
masters Chaumette and Hebert ; but, apart from the fact 
that this guilty renunciation would have been the con- 
demnation of the whole Commune, Chaumette and Hebert 
were not to reign there much longer, and even after their 
fall nobody spoke. 

If the attitude of the Commissioners is astonishing, that 
of the sequestered child arouses still more scepticism. 
We have seen with what care the Dauphin was treated 
as soon as he suffered from the slightest ailment, and 
with what assiduity expert and attentive doctors visited 
him. By a striking coincidence these visits ceased pre- 
cisely "in the early days of January," ^ at the very time 
they decided to remove the child from view. Had they 
waited until he was cured to martyrise him? Suppose 
we admit it ; in that case his health was completely re- 
established, and if the person they shut up was little 
Capet, turbulent, vivacious, wilful, "spoilt," one has 
said, "robust and fiery" says another, if it was the child 
whom the inhabitants of the Temple had seen jumping and 

^Simon came on guard on the 3rd of Ventose (February 21st) — 
29th of Ventdse (19th March)— the 14th of Germinal (April 3rd)— 
the 14th of Floreal (May 3rd)— and the 12th of Prairlal (May 
31st). 

'National Archives, F% 4792. 

173 



THE DAUPHIN 

running under the trees of the garden and heard singing 
the whole day, he was not going, from the first hour in 
his dark cell, to change suddenly in character and resign 
himself to isolation. Immured in Clery's old bedroom, 
the darkest and coldest of all, he would have wept, ham- 
mered with his little fists on the doorless partition, called 
at the top of his voice to his keepers, to his mother whom 
he still believed to be on the upper floor, he would have 
cried out to the commissioners when they entered the 
anteroom preceding his cell, as well as to the wood carriers 
who lighted the stove and the waiters who placed his 
food on the shelf of his wicket. He was neither taciturn 
nor timid. He had learnt from Simon, as we know only 
too well, a vocabulary which would have enabled him to 
express without periphrasis the ennuie he felt from his 
isolation. His sister and Aunt would not suddenly have 
ceased to catch the echo of his songs and his oaths. The 
ancient tower of the Temple was sonorous, since one could 
distinguish from one floor to another the noise of the 
pawns on the backgammon board. — But there is nothing 
of all that : the two princesses, who were continually wait- 
ing to hear the slightest noise of a nature to tell them 
what was happening in the dungeon, puzzled by the silence 
which now weighed on their prison, must have been per- 
suaded that the young prince had been taken away and 
replaced by a stranger. Sometimes they heard a door 
open, but never either word or cry. 

Can any light be obtained from the Temple accounts, 
so numerous and so revelatory for the period which 
preceded Simon's departure? None whatever. Yet it 
must have been necessary, when closing the cage in which 
the little king was to fade away, to have recourse to work- 
men. But not a single door was bound with iron; and 
without the assistance of a carpenter and a locksmith 
one cannot put up either a wicket or a tower. Now, the 
bills preserved in our archives reveal nothing like this 

174 



ENIGMAS 

to us.* All that we find is the following indication, under 
the date of the 22nd of Pluviose (February 15th): "In 
little Capet's room for the frame of a partition above 
the stove in his room, one piece of white glass 22 x 12 
inches ... 7 livres 10 sols," ^ and a fortnight later, the 
11th of Ventose (March 1st), a bill for work done "on 
the second floor of the tower, — viz., taking down and 
cleaning the stove pipes of the first room and replacing 
them inside the whole length and outside the whole height 
of the tower, — " ^ very vague information from which 
we can, at least, draw the conclusion that they entered 
the little captive's room, since they put in a pane of glass 
there, and that they prolonged the stove pipes of the 
anteroom.^ 

Besides, a glance at the distribution of the apartment 
suffices to show us that sequestration in a single room 
was impossible. Supposing that he was imprisoned in 
Clery's old bedroom, as tradition would have it, the 
child would necessarily have access to the water-closet in- 
stalled in the Southern turret, and consequently he would 
also be able to move about in the corridor leading to the 
former bedroom of Louis XVI.^ Had he been left the use 

*At least those we have consulted. Perhaps a few details are to 
be found in the series of which an inventory has not yet been made 
at the Archives. The accounts were audited sometimes a long time 
after the execution of the work, so that dates cannot serve as land- 
marks in such a matter. Moreover, the Temple accounts for this 
period of 1794 must have been preserved in the city archives that 
were destroyed. 

^Account for glazing done and furnished in the Temple to the 
orders of the Citizen Steward and the Citizen Commissioners, began 
in the month of Pluviose of the year II by Destrurael, glazier, 183 
Rue du Temple. National Archives, F', 4393. 

'Bill for stove work done at the Temple by Marguerite & Ferins, 
stove makers and chimney-sweeps, 13 Rue de Paradis, Faubourg 
Saint Denis. National Archives, F7, 4393. 

*It remains to be discovered what the glazier means by "the 
stove in little Capet's bedroom." If the Dauphin were shut up in 
Clary's bedroom, there was no stove; if he were in the king's old 
bedroom, there was a chimney. The only stoves were in the anteroom 
on the second floor and in the little round room of the turret which 
had served as an oratory for Louis XVI. 

^See the plan on page 18. 

175 



THE DAUPHIN' 

of the whole floor, was the famous wicket by means of 
which his jailors communicated with him pierced in the 
iron door opening on to the staircase? In that case, how 
did they light the stove in the anteroom? One's mind, 
moreover, refuses to accept the idea of an eight and a half 
year old child wandering the whole day amidst the soli- 
tude of those rooms and turrets without it once happen- 
ing that he injured himself or fell when trying to climb or 
move some piece of furniture. . . . And from questions 
to hypotheses we are led to this deduction: either the se- 
questration was not as absolute as pretended, or else its 
object was to hide the fact that the victim of so rigorous 
a measure was no longer the Dauphin. If it is true that 
the prisoner was buried in a dark room, that he was walled 
up so that nobody was able, in full daylight, to approach 
him, speak to him, distinguish his features, recognise him 
and at every hour verify his identity, it was because they 
could not show him. And thus arose the belief in some 
substitution or other ; for the parties who were quarrelling 
over the little King had too great an interest in pub- 
lishing his presence in the tower of the Temple to hide him 
in that way and thereby authorise suspicions and doubts 
which would diminish the value of the hostage they all 
coveted. 



Following Hebert and Chaumette in their rapidly de- 
scending path, we do not succeed any the better in discov- 
ering the naked truth. We are surprised, however, to 
note, as soon as the child is put in his cell, the cessation of 
their visits to the Temple where they had come so often. 
At the General Council they no longer spoke either of the 
royal prison or of its occupants, formerly subjects of al- 
most daily reference. Was this silence intentional, or must 
we not see in it an omission justified by more pressing 
anxieties? Hebert and Chaumette, without being yet 

176 



ENIGMAS 

pointed out, felt themselves, in fact, closely pursued by 
Robespierre; their disgrace was near at hand, the day 
not far off when the storm was to break over their heads. 
Here must be found room for an anecdote, probably with- 
out importance, but indicative of the hidden side of Chau- 
mette's complicated character. A few days after the 
death of Marie Antoinette, the Public Prosecutor of the 
Commune walked into a toy-shop kept by citoyennes 
Cornu, at the sign of la mam d'or in the Rue Saint 
Barthelemy, and drew from a pocket of his great-coat a 
pewter plate which the Queen had used during her cap- 
tivity at the Conciergerie and on which she had traced, 
in a circular manner, "starting at the centre and going 
towards the circumference, certain Italian and German 
phrases." Chaumette requested that this plate be fixed 
on a pedestal, in such a way "that the two sides could 
be seen.'* At the same time he ordered a vase "in which 
to place, he said, the ashes of a great man." The toy- 
dealer preserved the object for several months. One of 
her workmen was very anxious to copy the inscriptions 
traced by the Queen; but Madame Cornu objected. In 
the first fortnight of March, 1794, Chaumette reappeared 
and took back the precious knick-knacks, alleging "that he 
had changed his mind." ^ For whom did he intend this 
relic of the woman he had pushed to the scaff^old? 

On March 16th Paris heard of Hebert's arrest. The 
news caused a tremendous sensation. Pere Duchesne a 
royalist! Who would have thought it? Such, in fact, 
was his crime: he had been planning "to annihilate the 
sovereignty of the people and French liberty for ever, to 
re-establish despotism and the Monarch." ^ Two days 

^National Archives, F% 6711. This somewhat strange fact was re- 
ported in 1816 by a Mr. Defeugray, private secretary to the Prefect 
of the Somme. The police of Louis XVIII began to search and 
questioned Madame Cornu, who then lived at 34 Rue des Bernardins, 
"very old, infirm and declining." She and her daughter recollected 
very clearly Chaumette's two visits. 

'Indictment. Wallon's Histoire du Tribunal rdvolutionnaire de 
Paris, Vol. Ill, p. 47. 

177 



THE DAUPHIN 

later, Couthon from the Tribune of the Convention, pro- 
duced proof of it by revealing "that they had attempted 
to pass into the Temple a package containing fifty louis 
in gold, with which to facilitate Capet's escape; for the 
conspirators having formed a plan to establish a regency 
council the child's presence was necessary on the occa- 
sion of the Regent's installation." ^ There spread 
through the city the rumour of the incarceration "of 
men who, speaking only of liberty, had royalism at heart : 
he who was to have been appointed Regent of the Republic 
had just been arrested." ^ The Regent .-^ Chaumette 
was captured! He slept that night at the Luxembourg 
prison, and on the 28th of Ventose (March 18th) at the 
opening of the sitting of the General Council, where for 
the past eighteen months he had been adulated, the Presi- 
dent read a decree of the Committee of Public Safety ap- 
pointing provisionally Vincent Cellier in the place of 
Chaumette and Jacques Legrand in that of Hebert. 
Whereupon the Commune, prudent, but not over proud, 
decided "that the next day it would proceed in a body 
to the National Convention to congratulate it on the rig- 
orous measures taken to foil the plans of the con- 
spirators." Hebert and Chaumette were buried before 
being dead. 

Events did not move slowly. On the 14th Pere 
Duchesne, crippled with terror, was dragged to the scaf- 
fold; on April 5th it was the turn of Danton and his 
friends, also convicted of having attempted "the re-estab- 
lishment of the monarch, the destruction of National rep- 
resentation and republican government"; and on the 10th 
of the same month Chaumette's trial, rapidly settled like 

^Sitting of the Convention of the 26th of Ventose. Moniteur. 
Reprint, Vol. XIX, p. 715. Was it to this package of fifty louis 
that Hanriot alluded in the following proclamation to the National 
Guard? — "Yesterday my brothers-in-arms on duty at the Temple 
made a discovery which speaks in favour of their activity and love 
for the country." Courrier rSpublicain of the 28th of VentSse, p. 
144. 

"Courrier rSpublicain of the 24th of Ventose. 

178 



ENIGMAS 

the preceding ones, began. It seems that the ex-public 
prosecutor of the Commune had not yet lost all hope of 
saving his head, either because he counted on a sudden re- 
vival of his lost popularity or because he foresaw the 
probability in the near future of that monarchic restora- 
tion which then haunted all politicians and of which he 
was accused of being the principal supporter. At first, 
very abashed and rueful at the Luxembourg prison, he 
soon accepted with a sufficiency of good grace and even 
wittily the railleries of the imprisoned aristocrats.-*- He 
was hoping for an approaching change. His wife could 
be seen in the prison courtyard signalling to him that "all 
was going well" ; and from collected testimony it appears 
that at the Luxembourg itself the plot "to assassinate 
the members of the Committee of Public Safety and other 
patriots and to place little Capet on the Throne" was 
being continued.^ Even Fouquier-Tinville declared that, 
on the night preceding Chaumette's appearance before the 
tribunal, "seditious and revolutionary movements, in the 
course of which there were cries of long live the King, took 
place in various Parisian prisons." ^ Unless we con- 
sider the revolutionary tribunal as a slaughter house, we 
must indeed take these incriminations and depositions 
seriously, the other complaints invoked, such as the accu- 
sation of preaching atheism and starving Paris, remaining 
most vague and figuring only to expand the speech for the 
prosecution. It was, indeed, for having formed the plan 
"of re-establishing the royalty and giving a tyrant to the 
state" ■* that Pierre Gaspard alias Anaxagoras Chaumette, 
"recognised to be the author and accomplice of this con- 
spiracy," heard himself condemned to death. Suppos- 
ing that he was effectively guilty of this counter-revolu- 
tionary crime, and that he had, as an act of foresight, 

^Desessart. Proces fameux juges depuis la Revolution. Year VII, 
Vol. II. 
^Moniteur. Reprint, Vol. XX, p. 205, Extract from the indictment. 
"The same. 
*Fouquier-Tinville's speech for the prosecution. 

179 



THE DAUPHIN 

conjured away the son of Louis XVI to dispose of him 
without obstacle at the opportune moment, can we be 
astonished that he did not, in extremis, reveal that sub- 
traction? Before the verdict it would have meant hand- 
ing himself over to the executioner; once sentence was 
passed, it would have been bequeathing to those who sent 
him to his death the all saving-talisman of which, by keep- 
ing silence, he deprived them, by posthumous vengeance, 
forever. 

Without expressing the pretension to settle the ques- 
tion, it is evident that the hypothesis of the Dauphin hav- 
ing been abducted by Chaumette's order, on the departure 
of his docile agent Simon, is not incompatible with the 
rare and laconic documents which henceforth inform us 
concerning the sorrowful history of the child of the Tem- 
ple. For most certainly there was a child in the dark 
tower beyond the guard, the encircling walls, the wickets 
and iron doors, — a child of nine, solitary, silent, idle the 
whole day, wrapped up in his abandonment and thoughts. 

If it were the Dauphin, transformed by isolation to the 
point of being unrecognisable, if it were the son of Marie 
Antoinette, the frolicsome and wilful boy we have seen 
holding his own against members of the Convention, Mu- 
nicipal representatives and officers of the Temple guard, 
if it were he, what decadence ! With what a crushing 
weight was his young soul burdened! Did there rise up 
before him in the short stretch of his recollections, the 
fresh gardens of the Trianon made joyful by the song 
of birds and the fluttering of wings, the terrace at Ver- 
sailles peopled with marble statues aligned under a dome 
of flowering chestnut trees, whilst gentlemen, bowing re- 
spectfully, called him "Monseigneur" and beautiful ladies 
in furbelows enveloped him with care and homage? Did 
he dream of his garden in the Tuileries in the bright sun- 
light, where the sympathetic crowd, kept at a respectful 

180 



ENIGMAS 

distance by the soldiers, cried "Vive Monsieur le Dauphinr^ 
as soon as they caught sight of him, his little sword by 
his side, with his blue ribbon and, on his breast, a dia- 
mond star, the star of the Holy Spirit? Why did they 
now leave him alone, always alone? Why had the world 
become so wicked? Why never more recreations, games, 
reading, lessons? Why had they punished him so long? 
For what was he punished? Where was his Mamma, 
the beautiful Queen of whom he was so proud? Where 
were his sister and his aunt, his birds and his dog? 
Could they not have left him his dog? So many insolv- 
able problems for that little brain, formerly so diversely 
occupied and so attentive, but now ever empty, ever tor- 
mented ! 

If it were another than the little king, a child of the 
people substituted for him, a victim of Reason of State, 
what a still more anguish-stricken nightmare perhaps! 
What was this house, so sad, in which they kept him im- 
prisoned, and who were these men, never the same, whose 
voices he heard through the bars of his cage? Outside, 
Paris was in full swing; people walked about the streets; 
there were dealers, street boys running hither and thither, 
carriages, soldiers, women chattering around the foun- 
tains, joy, laughter, noise. . . . But everything was dead 
in the vicinity of the old dungeon. If any noise could be 
heard at the bottom of that dark room, it was that of a 
door clanging to or the brief commands of officers of the 
relieving guard. Imagine how terrifying these things 
must have been to a child who did not know where he 
was, who was ignorant as to how he had been brought 
there, who was doubtless forbidden, under pain of the 
direst punishments, to utter a complaint, to pronounce a 
word, or to put a question, and who, the whole day long, 
was on the watch, strove to guess the mystery, grew 
anxious, waited in vain for someone who would come and 
re-open for him the doors of life. In one case and in the 
other what a drama! It is hardly believable. 

181 



THE DAUPHIN 

Other enigmas are to be grafted on to that mystery. 
On January 19th, Simon, apparently very mortified and 
grumbling a great deal against the ingratitude of Chau- 
mette and the Commune, left the Temple. Now, the next 
day he proceeded towards a poor lodging where, living 
in retirement, were two old ladies of the nobility, both 
of them formerly nuns, and who received in their home 
a priest who, like them, had escaped from the spies of 
the Terror. They celebrated Mass in their attic; and 
that was why, hearing a knocking at their door, they 
were seized with great fear. However, they opened it, 
to find themselves face to face with a man they did not 
know. "Fear nothing," he said, seeing their emotion. "I 
know that you receive a priest here. I have come to ask 
him to say mass to-morrow for the King, the Queen, 
Madame Elizabeth and Madame de Lamballe. I am 
Simon ; but I will not betray you and I will even come to 
attend the mass. . . ." This incident is unexpected, too 
full of theatrical effect, too feuilletonesque to merit ex- 
amination by history. In order not to say that it is 
improbable, it would be necessary to be able, better than 
has been done, up to the present, to find out the intimate 
feelings of the people of France in the most harassing 
days of the Revolution. Numbers of the warmest and 
most sincere partisans of the Republic remained attached 
to old beliefs and respectful of traditions of the past. 
Is it borne in mind that, up to 1792, at the very least, 
the immense majority of those who were members of the 
Convention, Jacobins and Members of the Commune had 
frequented the churches, assisted at the services and car- 
ried out their religious duties? The rupture was very 
sudden, the change tumultuous ; but how many must have 
retained, at the bottom of their hearts, notwithstanding 
their blustering and bragging, the religious sentiment, the 
impress of a long atavism? Witness that member of 
the Committee of General Safety, Voulland, who at the 
height of the Terror, "went to cellars and garrets to at- 

182 



ENIGMAS 

tend on his own account" the masses of those refractory 
priests ^ who, officially and "out of a sense of duty" he 
persecuted. The incident of which we have just read, 
however, surprising it may be, shows that Simon was one 
of those men,^ and how can we doubt it, since it was 
revealed by the very granddaughter of the Marquise de 
Tourzel, governess of the son of Louis XVI, by her 
daughter Pauline de Tourzel, the playmate of the Dau- 
phin, by the great-niece of the two venerable ladies on 
whom Simon called and lastly by Madame Blanche de 
Beam, Sister Vincent in religious life, who received it 
directly from her father.^ 

At the time of Chaumette's death Simon was appointed 
an inspector of carriages,^ an employment which did not 
keep him away from Paris, since we find the ex-shoemalier 
still mounting guard from time to time at the Temple. 
As to "his wife," she had not ceased to frequent the prison. 
One could enter that so well guarded jail without a card 
"if one liked ; all that was necessary was, not to present 
oneself at the main entrance, where the sentinels were, 
but to knock at the door of the stables by means of a 
stone placed for a signal agreed upon between the door- 
keeper Piquet and people of the neighbourhood. Citizen 
Lelievre, then steward,^ having observed this stratagem, 
informed the Temple Council of it and the Commissioners, 
wishing to make the experiment for themselves, left the 
prison and came to knock at the said door. "Two citi- 
zens, who were passing, said to them: 'there is a stone 
to the left ; knock with it and they will open to you.* " 

^Memoir es de Fi4v4e. 

=»Married at the Church of Saint-Come on February 20th, 1788, 
Simon and his wife were, therefore, Catholics, although tliis has some- 
times been contested. 

*"I attest that I have just dictated everything which precedes, 
and I guarantee its authenticity." Rome, February 28th, 1904, 
Blanche de Beam, Sister Vincent H. de Granvelle. L'evasion de 
Louis XVII in the Revue de Paris for September 1st, 1904. 

*The 17th of Germinal (April 6th, 1794). National Archives, T. 
905. 

"Lelifevre had succeeded Coru in the early days of February. 

183 



THE DAUPHIN 

Having done this, they heard Piquet coming, saying: "it 
is some of our people." And he immediately opened.^ The 
Commissioners thus learnt that, amongst other persons 
Citoyenne Simon, who lodged as we have seen, in a house 
neighbouring the tower, thus obtained entrance. What 
did the cobbler's wife come there to do? How is it that, 
on meeting her in the prison courtyards, nobody was 
astonished at her presence? Why this tolerance in her 
case, and so much severity in that of Tison, the prin- 
cesses' ex-valet de chambre? For the latter was now in 
close custody in a bedroom of the little tower, — a room 
without either air or daylight, save what came from a 
loop-hole looking on to the dungeon staircase. What crime 
had Tison committed? Nobody knew, and in December, 
1793, Hebert demanded of the General Council that the 
question be made the object of a report." This report, 
drawn up by Godard,^ concluded in favor of the libera- 
tion of the prisoner, "the most minute examination having 
revealed nothing against the said Tison" ; * but it was to 
someone's interest that he should remain where he was, 
and that person obtained from the Committee of Public 
Safety an order to deprive the unfortunate man of every 
communication and to reduce his salary from five hun- 
dred livres to the strict necessary." ^ What had this 
man done, what had he said, what had he seen to warrant 
the Commune keeping him a captive for long months 
without informing itself of the reasons for his detention, 

^Paris Commune. Temple Council, June 18th, 1794. 

'General Council of the Commune. Sitting of the 22nd of Fri- 
maire (December 14th, 1793). Courrier r^publicain of the 24th. 

'Jean Francois Godard, builder and contractor. Rue Guisarde. 
Mucius Scaevola section. 

^General Council of the Commune. Sitting of the 4th of Niv6se. 
Courrier republicain of the 6th. 

'General Council of the Commune. Sitting of the 21st of Nivose. 
Moniteur of the 24th. "On the observation, made by the commis- 
sioners on guard at the Temple, that fellow-citizens employed in 
the Tower could communicate with Tison through the door of his 
room, the General Council decrees that this door be condemned." 
The 8th of Ventose, Year II, Register of deliberations of thv Com- 
mune. National Archives, F', 4391. 

184 



ENIGMAS 

without any entry of a commitment, without a trial and 
without judgment: The State prisoners formerly in- 
terned in the Bastille at least had the consolation of not 
being in ignorance of the fact that they were incarcerated 
because such was "the good pleasure of the King. . . ." 



After Simon's exodus absolute silence enshrouded the 
Temple. Mention was sometimes made of the two female 
prisoners on the third floor. One day, at the General 
Council Daujon indignantly protested against the ex- 
orbitant expense occasioned the Commune by the Medi- 
cinal infusions supplied to the daughter of the tyrant;^ 
on another occasion Godard set forth that, "having vis- 
ited the apartments, the woman Elizabeth presented him 
with her thimble, pierced and useless." He noticed that 
"the thimble was of gold and asked to be allowed to place 
it with its case on the table." The Commune, grand and 
generous, decreed that the object be sold in aid of the 
poor and that "the woman Elizabeth be supplied with a 
brass or ivory thimble." ^ Of the little king nobody made 
any mention. On one occasion, however, — it was after the 
death of Chaumette and Hebert, — some municipal repre- 
sentatives denounced their colleague Crescend.^ "He had 
offered himself very often for duty at the Temple, al- 
though his turn had not come, and had been moved to 
pity by the lot of Charles Capet," pretending that "this 
child was badly brought up." Crescend was immediately 
expelled from the Council and sent to the police.* And 
here we have a disconcerting incident. The commis- 

*General Council of the Commune. Sitting of the 19th of Pluvidse. 
Courrier r4publicain of the 21st. 

'General Council of the Commune. Sitting of the 24th of Pluviose. 
Courrier r4publicain of the 26th. 

*His name is not on the lists published by the National Almanachs 
of 1793 and 1794. Perhaps we ought to read his name as Cresson. 

♦General Council of the Commune. Sitting of the 7th of Germinal. 
Courrier ripuhlicain of the 9th. 

185 



THE DAUPHIN 

sioners had not contented themselves then with glancing 
through the peephole at the padlocked prisoner in his 
filthy hole ; they had approached him, conversed with him, 
and he had replied, since they had been able to judge of 
his bad education. And why did Crescend say not a 
word? It was a splendid opportunity to reveal the hor- 
rible infection of the cell, the deplorable state of the 
"whelp," "dirty, consumed with vermin and disputing 
with the rats the bread they threw to him." Nobody 
would have dared to support the prolongation of so 
sordid a torture and so much the more so that Chaumette 
was no longer to divert the discussion. The Hotel de 
Ville had lost in him its fool and favourite preacher. A 
newcomer, austere and grave, replaced Anaxagoras at 
the Public Prosecutor's Office, — viz., Payan, a protege 
of Robespierre, — Payan who, born of an honourable and 
well-to-do family of the Drome, had come from his 
province to serve the Republic, first of all as Secretary 
to the Committee of Public Safety and then as juryman 
on the revolutionary Tribunal. He was now National 
Agent of the Commune, and under his impulsion it, care- 
fully recruited, was henceforth to become, with notorious 
suppleness, the docile instrument of the "Incorruptible." 
Through the Commune, Robespierre would then be the 
master of the Temple still more than Chaumett'C had been. 
Was he not, moreover, in that spring of the year II master 
of the whole of France? He commanded the Committee 
of Public Safety ; they acclaimed him at the Convention ; 
he had struck down everything which hampered him or 
was an obstacle in his path — Girondins, Hebertists, Dan- 
tonists, the Reactionaries as well as the Exageres (ul- 
tras), to speak the jargon of the time; and we are in 
accord with his eulogists in stating that, free at last to 
direct his policy as he liked, he now inclined towards mod- 
eration and sought to fix the conquests of the Revolution 
on an indestructible base. 

We should have the appearance of forcing the para- 

186 



ENIGMAS 

dox by insinuating that Robespierre, at that period of 
his greatest height, was premeditating a return to the 
constitutional royalty; but of what was he dreaming? 
We do not know. Certainly he was dreaming of some- 
thing. The care he took to surround himself with de- 
voted men, his continual search for patriots "having 
talents more or less," the aversion, from day to day more 
accentuated, which he professed for compromised or cor- 
rupted politicians, his need of being kept informed by 
spies devoted to him, those deistic demonstrations which 
voluntarily contrasted with the sacrilegious eccentricities 
of the disciples of Reason, everything indicated that he 
was preparing an evolution. He was not in ignorance 
of the fact that the people, tired of blood, misery, speeches 
and disorder, would acclaim the man who was sufficiently 
influential and sufficiently bold to close the Terror, to 
assure peace and restore France to its abolished tran- 
quillity. As a prudent and thoughtful politician, Robes- 
pierre could no more disinterest himself than many others 
in the little King whom they still thought was preserved 
in the Temple to be, at the opportune hour, the winning 
trump in the decisive game. The day after the Queen's 
execution, Saint Just, reflecting his master's thought, 
said: "The Guillotine has cut there a powerful knot of 
the diplomacy of the Courts of Europe." ^ In the ab- 
sence of his mother, the son could advantageously serve 
as a guarantee; he who spoke in his name to the allied 
powers would be certain to be heard, and this patriotic 
hope was, moreover, the only motive which justified the 
child's long detention. From the grouping of certain in- 
dications, up to the present so scattered that they re- 
mained unperceived, there stands forth the very plausible 
presumption that Robespierre did not undervalue the hos- 
tage which he flattered himself he would be able to make 
use of should an opportunity off'er. First of all, there is 
a note from the British spy to Lord Grenville, dated April 

Wilate. Causes secretes de la Revolution. 

187 



THE DAUPHIN 

25th: "They do not doubt that, in the present state of 
affairs, Robespierre has one of these two plans : to carry 
off the King to the Southern provinces if the armies (of 
the enemy) approach Paris, — and that is the Committee's 
project; or take the King to Meudon and make his per- 
sonal treaty with the Power which draws the nearer to 
Paris, — and that is the plan of which Robespierre is ac- 
cused." To carry this out happily, it was necessary to 
make sure of the possibility of getting the child prisoner 
out of the Temple with every possible discretion. It 
seems, indeed, that they occupied themselves with this, 
for among the papers found at Robespierre's was discov- 
ered a notebook which had belonged to Payan, and in 
which had been rapidly scribbled a number of phrases re- 
minding him of what he had to do during the day. In 
it we find the following sheet, undated, but which, after 
an examination of the preceding leaves and those which 
follow, must refer to May, 1794. At first sight it appears 
somewhat hieroglyphic ; reproduced textually it is as 
follows : 

1st. Cook to be appointed. 2nd. Arrest the old one. 3rd. Villers, 
friend of Saint Just, to be employed. 4th. Entrust the mayor and 
municipal agent with the exemption. 5th. Nicholas will instruct 
Villers. 6th. Opium. 7th. A doctor. 8th, Appointment of Members 
of the Council. 9th. Place, the first two or three days, new ones. 
10th, Report we present, (sic.y 

If we recollect that, of all the important servants at the 
Temple, the cook Gagnie remained the only one who had 
not been dismissed; that Villers was the name of a young 
man, an ex-officer of dragoons, who had shared with 
Robespierre, at the beginning of his career, a modest lodg- 
ing in the Rue de Saintonge;^ that, after having lost 
sight of him, Robespierre, "at the time when he was at the 
height of his fortune," made enquiries about him; that 
Nicolas, a printer and juryman on the Revolutionary 
Tribunal, was a zealot of the "Incorruptible" and counted 

^Papiers inedits trouves chez Robespierre. Vol. II, pp. 389-390. 

^Pierre Villers, in his Souvenirs d'umpeport4 published in the year 
X, supplies interesting details concerning his life in common with 
Robespierre. 



ENIGMAS 

among his bodyguard; if we observe that this appoint- 
ment of members of the Council "on which new ones 
would be placed the first two or three days" appears to 
refer to the Temple Council and could only indeed refer 
to it ; that opium would serve to send someone to sleep 
and a doctor to superintend the effect of that narcotic, 
we conclude that all these precautions, noted in Payan's 
notebook, seem to indicate a plan they did not wish to 
noise abroad, a plan for the execution of which they would 
have recourse to only very trustworthy confidants, "me 
present," — a proof that the affair was important and 
that its "statement" necessitated unequivocal wording. 

May, 1794. — The time was well chosen. The only one 
of the princesses remaining in the Temple was Madame 
Royale, whom it would be easy to deceive should some ru- 
mour of the event reach her. They had got rid of Madame 
Elizabeth, whose suspicious perspicacity might have been 
embarrassing: in twenty-four hours she had been removed 
from the Temple, judged, condemned and executed. . . . 
In the evening of that same day, May 10th, Robespierre 
entered, as he often did, the shop of Maret, the bookseller 
in the Palais Royal. Whilst turning over the leaves of 
some new books, he asked for news and the subject of 
people's conversation. Maret, a convinced Royalist and 
Catholic, was unable, despite the indifferent good nature 
he ordinarily affected, to repress his indignation. "Peo- 
ple are murmuring and crying out against you," he said. 
"What did Madame Elizabeth do to you? Why did you 
send that innocent and virtuous person to the scaffold ?"^ — 
"I assure you, my dear Maret," replied Robespierre, 
"that, far from being the author of Madame Elizabeth's 
death, I wanted to save her. It was that wretch Collot 
d'Herbois who dragged her from me." ^ His visit to the 
bookseller's and the question he asked, on such a day, 
are revelatory of his anxiety of the moment; for about 

^Essais historiques sur les causes et les e'jfets de la revolution de 
France by Beaulieu, Vol. VI, p. 10. 

189 



THE DAUPHIN 

the same time, perhaps the next day/ he visited the 
Temple. Madame Royale makes a note of it in her jour- 
nal. "One day there came a man who I believe was Robes- 
pierre. The municipal representatives showed great re- 
spect towards him and his visit was a secret. The people 
of the tower did not know who he was. He came to my 
room, looked at me insolently, inspected the books and, 
after having whispered with the municipal officers went 
away." It was not merely "to look insolently" at the 
daughter of Louis XVI that Robespierre risked this 
inspection at the Temple, where he had come but once 
before nearly two years previously." Before ascending 
to Marie Therese's, he most certainly stopped on the 
second floor. Did he see the Dauphin? Was the door, 
"closed with nails and screws," which separated the living 
from the sequestrated child opened for him.'' Here, as all 
through the history of the captivity in the Temple, we 
encounter irreconcilable statements. The very fact of 
Robespierre's visit would have to be rejected if we did 
not find, in a way, the corollary in a report from Lord 
Grenville's agent, who wrote: "on the night of the 23rd 
to the 24th — May — Robespierre went to the Temple to 
fetch the king and take him to Meudon." The fact is cer- 
tain, although known only to the Committee of Public 
Safety. It is believed to be certain that he was brought 
back to the Temple on the night of the 24th to the 25th, 
and that this was a trial to make sure of the ease with 
which he could be taken possession of. "Later," the 
English informer states that the "king was brought back 
to the Temple on May SOth.^ 

HI!hanteIauze and Beauchesne place this visit on May 11th. 

°0n September 3rd, 1792, he had been chosen by the insurrectional 
Commune, of which he was a member, "to re-establish tranquillity at 
the Temple." Beaucourt, Vol. II, p. 49. 

^Fortescue; — Since May 18th (29th of Floreal) the number of com- 
missioners at the Temple had been reduced from four to three. 
National Archives F', 4391. In the series of powers of the Com- 
missioners we do not find anything which indicates, on the dates 
mentioned by the English spy, any derogation from the ordinary 
supervision. Alphabetic order was still followed — ^with a few excep- 

190 



ENIGMAS 

One can well understand Robespierre, concerned about 
the dignity and interests of France, removing the little 
prisoner from the horror of his confinement and placing 
him at the Chateau de Meudon, a convenient and salu- 
brious residence which ought to have been chosen long 
before as a place of detention for the son of Louis XVI. 
That was, at one and the same time, an act of hu- 
manity and good policy. But why, immediately the diffi- 
cult transfer was accomplished, permit reintegration in 
the Temple? In one's mind, disconcerted by a combina- 
tion so useless, so perilous and so complicated, is strength- 
ened the belief in a previous substitution of which Robes- 
pierre had up to then not the slightest suspicion. He 
undertook to put an end to the martyrdom of that inno- 
cent boy and suddenly discovered that someone had "done 
the trick" before him! The child he had just abstracted 
from the noisome prison was not the little king! He saw 
that, as soon as he examined him at leisure, as soon as he 
pressed him with questions. What was to be done.'' Pub- 
lish the fact and noise abroad his discomfiture.'* But 
that would have meant telling the whole of Europe that 
the Republic had lost the guarantee on which it had so 
long founded the hope of coming to a composition with 
its enemies. Better reveal nothing and reincarnate the 
anonymous prisoner for whom the Temple was an investi- 
ture and who, on condition that he was never produced, 
might still serve for eventual negotiations. This is but 
a hypothesis, or, to speak more correctly, an induction, 
perilous process of reasoning forbidden to historians but 
which is excusable owing to the obscurity in which this 
question is debated. This induction, carried still further, 

tions — in the choice of Comraissioners. A little anomaly, however, 
must be pointed out. On May 23rd (the 4th of Prairial) the Com- 
mune took care to appoint, in advance, the commissioners for that 
day and the two following days. On May 27th (the 8th of Prairial) 
the same thing happened again. Ordinarily, commissioners were 
appointed "to go to the Temple this evening," except on the eve of 
decadis when the Commune appointed commissioners for the same 
day and that following, decadi, on which it did not sit. National 
Archives, F', 4391. 

191 



THE DAUPHIN 

would perhaps also elucidate a singular change which 
took place at that very time in Robespierre's attitude. 
From the early days of June he was visibly disabled. 
He deserted the Committee of Public Safety ;^ "he resigned 
completely his part of dictatorial authority and aban- 
doned the exercise of government to his colleagues." ^ 
His most fervent apologist, Ernest Hamel, seeking to dis- 
cover the causes of this sudden renouncement, confesses 
"that it is somewhat difficult to express oneself very affirm- 
atively in this respect,"^ and Robespierre himself, in that 
beautiful and obscure speech which has been called "his 
last will and testament," contented himself with giving 
as the motive for his voluntary retreat "the powerless- 
ness to do good and to arrest evil," — a poor excuse for 
a political man who retires after having involved in his 
policy so many chosen and determined partisans. Did 
he not have a clear vision of that powerlessness on the 
day when he found himself deprived of the royal child, the 
secret object of his policy, at the very moment he thought 
he had secured him? A conjecture which may seem para- 
doxical — fanciful perhaps — and which historians have not 
up to now considered, because not one of them as yet cor- 
rectly estimated the importance of that little boy of nine 
who, as has been said, could not leave his prison "with- 
out being the first among Frenchmen, the King." * 



On the 8th of Thermidor Dorigny, a municipal officer 
of the Popincourt section, said to his fellow citizens in 
his district : "you would be very astonished if, to-morrow, 

^In his speech of the 8th of Thermidor he admitted that "for more 
than six weeks he had absolutely abandoned his duties as a member 
of the Committee of Public Safety." 

'Ernest Hamel. Histoire de Rohespierre, Vol. Ill, p. 599. 

^"The Thermidorians," he adds, "who alone are able to inform us 
on that point, having greatly varied in their explanations." Eri>est 
Hamel. 

*Comte de Falloux. Memoires cVtm RoyaUste, Vol. II, p. 34. 

192 



ENIGMAS 

a king ^ were proclaimed to you." The next day Robes- 
pierre fell and with him the Paris Commune.^ Barras, 
carried by circumstances to the post of General-in-chief 
of the Army of the Interior and of the Command of Paris, 
had assisted in the triumph of the Convention and, finding 
himself suddenly inheriting the preponderant authority of 
the man he had just overthrown, it would seem that he did 
not lose a single hour at aiming at the same object. Like 
all those who had preceded him at the helm of the pitching 
vessel of the revolution, he steered for the Temple in order 
to secure the person of little Capet. A rumour of the 
escape of the young prince had spread during the night 
and found believers even on the Committee of the Con- 
vention.^ On the 10th, at six A. M.,^ Barras was at the 
prison and ordered that the Son of Louis XVI be shown 
to him. At last the conditions of his six months' seques- 
tration was to be known, the obscurity with which the 
boy's imprisonment was enveloped to be dispersed. . . . 
No ; nothing would be known ! Here, textually, is the 
brief account Barras left of that visit: "I was at the 

^Moniteur. Reprint Vol. XXI, p. 497. Sitting of the Conven- 
tion of 27th of Thermidor. Speech of Barras. On the 4th of Ven- 
demiaire, year III, Breard, a member of the Committee of Public 
Safety, read to the Convention a letter written by a Martinique 
Colonist attesting that, in March, 1794, an English officer named 
Bentabourg had said to the host with whom he was staying: "Robes- 
pierre is protecting the daughter and son of the King of France: 
he it is who will get them over to England . . . etc." The remark 
was made in tlie presence of ten citizens ready to swear to it. 
Moniteur. Reprint, Vol. XXII, p. 69. 

^During the cruel agony which the victors of Thermidor meted out 
to the vanquished, there was, amongst other episodes, one that was 
somewhat striking. "When Robespierre arrived at the Conciergerie, 
it is said that he asked the turnkey, by means of signs, to bring him a 
pen and ink. The turnkey brutally replied: 'What the devil do you 
want to do? Do you want to write to your Supreme Being?'" 
Nougaret. Histoire des Prisons, Vol. IV, p. 312. One cannot help 
thinking that, to dream of writing at such a time, the dying man must 
have intended to reveal things of the utmost importance and ioterest 
to the country. The odious suspicion of a jailor has deprived pos- 
terity of those confidences. 

'M6moires de Barras, Vol. I, p. 205. 

*Madame Roy ale. 

193 



THE DAUPHIN 

Temple ^ and found the young prince in a cradle-shaped 
bed in the middle of his room. He was in a sound sleep 
and woke with difficulty. He was wearing trousers and a 
grey cloth jacket. I asked him how he was and why he 
did not sleep in the big bed. He replied : 'My knees are 
swollen and pain me at times when I am standing. The 
little cradle suits me better.' I examined his knees and 
found them very swollen, as well as his ankles and hands. 
His face was puffed and pale. After asking him if he had 
what was necessary and having advised him to walk, I 
gave orders to the Commissioners and scolded them for 
the neglected state of the room. ... I proceeded to the 
Committee of Public Safety. Order has not been troubled 
at the Temple, but the prince is dangerously ill. I ordered 
that he should be taken for a walk and summoned Mon- 
sieur Dussault {sic). It is urgent that you should con- 
sult other doctors, that they examine his condition and 
give him all the care his condition (sic) demands. The 
Committee gave orders in consequence." 

They saw him. But there is nothing to indicate that, 
in order to reach the prisoner, it was necessary to sum- 
mon workmen, to employ pickaxe or pincers, or to "un- 
seal" any door. It is true the narrative contains an 
allusion to the "neglected state" of the room; but there 
is again nothing to evoke the idea of a filthy hole where 
dirt, debris of food and other accumulated refuse ren- 
dered the air unbreathable. If their author was not the 
most convicted knave in history, these few lines would 
alone suffice to destroy the legend of sequestration. More- 
over, in this narrative, most precious though it is, since 
it comes from one who was the first to see the prisoner 
after two hundred days of a mysterious seclusion, there 
are gaps unpardonable if they were not intentional. Did 

^Mimoires de Barras. We here reproduce, not the text of the 
Memoirs written and edited by Rousselin de Saint-Albin, but Barras' 
own terms which Monsieur Georges Duruy took care to quote in the 
fine preface of his edition of the Memoirs of the ex-Director, Vol. I, 
XII. 

194 



ENIGMAS 

Barras recognise the child presented to him as the son of 
Louis XVI? He does not say so. He had never been 
to Court; but he may have caught sight of the young 
prince during the days which preceded August 10th, 1792, 
and he certainly conceived a doubt on finding in that small 
mean bed that half-awakened, bloated and stiff little 
boy, who could have borne no resemblance whatever either 
to the charming and lively child of the Tuileries or to 
his portraits formerly spread about in profusion. To 
make certain of the captive's identity, Barras must have 
questioned him with some insistence and not contented 
himself with merely asking why he preferred the cradle 
to the big bed. It is singular that he does not touch 
upon that essential point in his narrative. On ascending 
to Madame Royale's, after his visit to the second story, 
he was much more loquacious and cautious. "He spoke 
to me, called me by my name, said many other things to 
me . . ." wrote the young princess, and he prolonged 
his visit to such an extent that Marie Therese had to 
politely dismiss him.-^ Moreover, if Barras believed, on 
that day, that he had been placed in the Dauphin's pres- 
ence, his later conduct proved that he was not long in 
being undeceived. The three last Commissioners chosen 
by the Commune to superintend the Temple were ap- 
pointed on the evening of the 8th of Thermidor.^ On the 
9th, the Council was too tragically occupied to think of 
delegating three of the members to go to the Royal prison, 
so the Municipal representatives on guard since the eve- 
ning of the 8th remained at their posts the 9th, 10th and 
llth,^ which probably saved them from the guillotine. 
But they could not remain there indefinitely. The Com- 
mune — which ended as it had begun, by insurrection — 
being dissolved and all its members outlawed, it was neces- 
sary, then, as soon as possible, to try to find guardians for 

^Madame Royale. 

*We do not possess their names, the series of powers preserved at 
the Archives stopping at the 3rd of Thermidor. F% 4391. 
'National Archives, A. F. 11, 47-363. 

195 



THE DAUPHIN 

the two child prisoners and on the day of the 10th the 
Committee of General Safety entrusted that delicate mis- 
sion to Jerome, a member of the revolutionary Committee 
of the Bondy section, and to Albert, invested with a sim- 
ilar mandate by the Unite section. But General Barras 
wanted a man of his own there. During "the battle" of 
the 9th he had noticed the somewhat turbulent zeal of 
a young patriot, a Creole of Martinique named Christophe 
L'aurfent,^ who had had the perspicacity, during the 
crisis, to display his ardent enthusiasm for the cause of 
the Convention and his no less accentuated animosity 
against the Commune. Moreover, Laurent had a surety 
near Barras in the person of the General's private secre- 
tary Botot, Justice of the Peace of the Temple Section, 
where Laurent was Clerk of the Court. The decree of the 
10th was, therefore, repealed. Albert and Jerome re- 
mained at home and, on the 11th, the Creole was ap- 
pointed temporary guardian of Capet's children.^ He 
proceeded to the Temple at half past nine at night and 
was received by the three surviving Commissioners of the 
annihilated Commune who installed him, led him to the 
rooms of the two prisoners and then disappeared.^ 

Laurent was intelligent, active, shrewd and of agree- 
able appearance ; he expressed himself well, wrote with 
ease and his manners contrasted advantageously with 
those of the red-capped, rough-mannered sans-culottes 
who, for nearly two years, had reigned over the Temple. 
He owed his new position solely to Barras' protection. 
Wholly devoted to the "General," he could be counted 
upon to follow his instructions to the letter, — that is to 
say, he would take the prisoner out for walks, he would 
request Dr. Dessault, chief surgeon at the big Humanite 

^Frederic Barbey devoted to Laurent a very precious study pub- 
lished by tiie Revue on September 15th, 1909. 

"National Archives, A. F. 17, 47-363. The decree appointing Jerome 
is in the file with words struck out and written over. It was issued 
in the name of the Committee of Public Safetj' and General Safety 
and signed Barfere. 

'Madame Royale. 

196 



ENIGMAS 

Hospital — the Hotel Dieu — to examine the little patient, 
he would have the room cleaned and aired, and would 
take the greatest care of the child of whom he was the 
sole guardian. . . . But nothing of that sort happened! 
Laurent took care not to call in the Doctor; the poor 
captive did not leave his prison ; nay, more, his new 
guardian had so great a fear of letting him be seen, that 
he would not allow servants even to enter his room to 
clean it. What was the reason for this inexcusable negli- 
gence? Was it not that Laurent, at the first contact, 
was convinced of the Dauphin's absence.'' A document 
preserved amongst the Temple papers seems to confirm 
this hypothesis. It is an order given by Laurent himself, 
two days after his arrival at the Temple, to place seals 
immediately on Simon's papers, — a document insignifi- 
cant in appearance but singularly demonstrative. On 
the evening of the 11th, on arriving at the prison, the 
Creole found the child asleep, so it was not until next 
morning that he occupied himself with and questioned 
him. Since Simon's departure, he was the first person 
who had been able to speak at leisure with the little 
abandoned one ; the first who took the trouble and the 
time to inspire confidence in him, to pet him, to awaken 
his memory, to make him talk ; and it was not long before 
he was certain that the child was not the son of Louis 
XVI. Barras was immediately informed that the Dau- 
phin had been abducted. Who was holding him.'' Who 
could indicate the place where they had hidden him.'' The 
revelation was illuminating; this then was the explana- 
tion of this prisoner's isolation of six months. Six 
months ! This lapse of time agreed with the date of 
Simon's retirement, he who had been the blind agent 
of Chaumette and Hebert. Both were long since dead, 
whilst Simon had just ended his days on Robespierre's 
scaffold. But perhaps there remained at his house some 
indication, which must be secured as quickly as possible. 
That was why Laurent, usurping powers quite in oppo- 

197 



THE DAUPHIN 

sition to his position as jailor and not concerned in the 
least, legally, in the matter, took upon himself to demand 
the placing of seals on the shoemaker^s effects.-^ In this 
manner, if anything were discovered there, everything 
would remain between Barras and his two tools, Laurent, 
the promoter of the measure, and Botot, the Justice of 
the Peace of the section. The Creole's interference in 
this affair would be absolutely inexplicable if it did not 
imply a correlation between an incident of his present 
duties and Simon's long since lapsed administration. 

Does this reasoning appear too subtle and the conse- 
quence arbitrary.'' We possess other suppositions of the 
conviction born in Laurent's mind. First of all, can we 
appreciate at its value the conception of that thoughtless 
Barras who provided a Creole of twenty-four as a guard 
for a young girl of sixteen? ^ The whole day and night 
he could entor her quarters ; he was the only human being 
she saw, not even a woman entering the Tower; he had 
possession of all the keys and opened all the doors ; no 
commissioner shared the work of supervision, and as he 
showed a politeness to which Marie Therese was no longer 
accustomed, as he was respectful and obliging ^ — strange 
novelties for the young princess — it is not beyond the 
bounds of possibility that a sort of comradeship sprang 

"'The 13th of Thermidor, French Republic. The Commissioner, 
entrusted by the Committees of Public Safety and General Safety 
of the National Convention with the supervision of the Temple, 
requests the citizens composing the Revolutionary Committee of the 
Temple Section to proceed immediately to the Temple enclosure (A) 
to place seals there on the furniture and effects forming part of the 
property of the man Simon, who died by the law, in order to preserve 
the said eflFects which belong to the Republic. Made in the tower of 

the Temple the 13th of Thermidor of the year II Laurent, 

Commissioner of the Convention. 

(A) Laurent is here juggling with words. We have seen that the 
lodging occupied by the Simons was, in fact, situated not within the 
prison enclosure but outside the walls, in the old enclosure of the 
Knights Templars, which formed an immense quarter, quite free of 
access, and including shops, dwelling houses, private residences, etc. 

'Christophe Laurent was born on July 25th, 1770. Barbey, loc. cit. 

'"He took more care of me: he often asked me if I had need of 
anything and begged me to ask for what I wanted and to ring. He 
was most polite." — Madame Roy ale. 

198 



ENIGMAS 

up between them. Certainly we have the certitude that 
the pride of Marie Antoinette's daughter protected her 
against any surprise of her young imagination, but since 
Madame EHzabeth's departure she had conversed with 
nobody; it was a year since she had seen any other men 
than the execrated Commissioners of the Commune, the 
brutal turnkeys or the servants employed to place at 
her door water and wood or the linen brought back by 
the laundry maid; so that the appearance, in her 
monotonous life, of this discreet and well-educated young 
Creole must have awakened her curiosity. As to himself, 
it is not possible that he did not experience a feeling of 
tender veneration towards his engaging ward. The fact 
of being imprisoned in a dark tower with a young and 
persecuted princess constitutes a common situation in 
fairy tales or tender romances of chivalry, but is ex- 
tremely rare and delicate in real life. For Laurent was 
also sequestered. He did not leave the Temple and his 
only distraction was to meet, at meal times in the Council 
room, the two officers commanding the guard and 
Lienard,^ the new steward, who had been appointed on 
the 12th of Thermidor to replace the arrested Lelievre. It 
is not at all astonishing that he should have shown haste 
when he heard the sound of the prisoner's bell, which rang 
perhaps somewhat more frequently than was strictly in- 
dispensable. 

One must not imagine this was the beginning of a 
romantic idyll the mere supposition of which would be as 
imaginary as out of place,^ but it is important to know 

'Andre Li^nard, forty-five years, a native of the department of the 
Nord, cloth merchant, Rue de la Heaummerie; ex-president of the 
Lombards section. Barbey, loc. cit. 

*In the course of this narrative we have carefully avoided up to 
now placing any reliance on legend; but it is not useless to indicate 
at times, in passing, to what an extent it has sprung up like a 
thicket around the history of the Temple. In 1881, there died in a 
town of the department of Ardeche a lady, P. de V., who was said 
to have been the daughter of Madame Royale, prisoner in the Temple 
and "a great English lord!" Was not the extravagant rumour set 
afloat in Paris in December 1795 that the Commissioners charged 

199 



THE DAUPHIN 

the attitude affected by Laurent when Marie Therese 
spoke to him about her brother. Admitting there was this 
sort of intimacy, which would necessarily spring up be- 
tween the young girl and her guardian, she would cer- 
tainly have asked to see the Dauphin. And he could 
not have refused her request on the ground of his in- 
structions, since Barras, on his first visit, and other 
members of the Convention later, had given an order that 
the brother and sister be re-united and that they 
be taken for walks together.-^ Clemency reigned. Dur- 
ing that sunny Thermidor, when the doors of all the 
prisons of France were being thrown open, who would 
have protested if, for an hour or two, the children of 
the Tyrant played together under the chestnut-tree of 
the garden.'^ How, then could Laurent have resisted the 
prisoner's prayers .f* Why did he persist in refusing to 
hear her supplications.'' Since he was sole master in the 
Tower, since no one controlled his acts, since he would not 
have broken any rule by allowing them to embrace, how 
is it he had the courage to refuse to grant them that 
immense joy.'' What could he have said to Marie Therese 
to rid himself of her entreaties .f* She noted in her Journal 
that he showed pity towards the little prince, that he 
washed and bathed him ; ^ she knew that he procured a 

to accompany as far as Bale the daughter of Louis XVI, handed 
over to Austria, "had tried to violate her en route?" Report to 
the Minister of the Interior. National Archives, F 111, Seine 18, 
Aulard. Paris rendant la Reaction thermidorienne, II 564, The sub- 
stitution of a girl of the people for Madame Royale during her so- 
journ at the Temple is a version which was current in a few "well- 
informed circles," and, without having been so numerous as the false 
Dauphins, false Duchesses of Angouleme appeared at the time of the 
Restoration. 

^"I ordered that the two children of the King of France be allowed 
to walk daily in the prison courtyards ... I have since learnt from 
a Commissioner of the Temple that my orders have not been carried 
out." Barras' Memoirs, vol. I, pp. 205-206. The same order was 
given in December by Harmand of the Meuse and his colleagues. 
See page 218. 

"'He gave my brother baths and washed away the vermin with 
which he was covered." 

200 



ENIGMAS 

clean bed ^ for him ; but she also knew that the poor 
little fellow was "always alone in his room" and that 
"he remained thus during the whole summer." — 
"Laurent," she writes, "visited him three times (a day); 
but, for fear of compromising himself, he did not dare 
(**c)." Thus, it is proved: — either that Laurent lied to 
Madame Royale, leaving her to believe that nothing had 
changed since the 9th of Thermidor, that the Terror 
was still raging, and that he would run the risk of the 
scaffold if he allowed her to see her brother; he says 
nothing of the orders he had "to re-unite the children of 
the King of France;" — or else those orders had been 
revoked as soon as received, and we still come back to 
the same question : Why? if not because the child they 
held could not be shown? Laurent must also have lied 
to the National guards and servants, who were also 
astonished at this abnormal confinement. They were not 
to be deceived like Madame Royale ! but to these the 
Creole related that little Capet was too ill to profit by 
the authorisations granted. Hoav did he succeed in mak- 
ing them believe that this child of nine, shut up for the 
past six months, refused to come out into the open air, 
to return to his former games, his balls, his quoits, his 
racquets? — that he had not — if it were he! — asked for 
his dog, shown a desire to see his dear birds again? But 
nothing of the sort. Although the evident interest of 
the State demanded that they should produce the son 
of Louis XVI, that they should proclaim his presence, 
nobody was admitted to catch a glimpse of him even for 
a moment. Of the three waiters, Caron, Vandebourg 
and Lermouzeau, who, at fixed hours, carried the meals 
from the kitchens to the floors above, not one testified 
that they had ever served him directly. Laurent remained 
inflexible and the prison impenetrable; no jailor was 
less communicative, more silent, more "close." This 

'"Laurent had a bed, which was in my room, taken down for my 
brother, as his was full of bugs." 

201 



THE DAUPHIN 

silence, this circumspect and distrustful reserve con- 
trasted so singularly with his age, his colonial origin and 
his eventful past that his transformation appeared 
suspicious to those who had known him previously. 
People in the neighbourhood grew concerned, and his 
former colleagues of the Temple section issued a decree 
declaring that Laurent had lost their confidence, that 
they considered it "impolitic and even dangerous in the 
public interest that such a man should remain entrusted 
with the custody of Capet's son." ^ Sure of himself and 
confident in his protector, Laurent turned not a hair: 
he boldly brought a complaint before the Committee of 
Public Safety, declaring that, if justice were not done 
him, he was ready to resign a post "which he had in no 
way sought." ^ He made no change, however, in his 
manner of acting and succeeded in sequestrating his 
prisoner so perfectly that the citizen-soldiers, convoked 
to the Temple daily to guard the Tower there, expressed 
astonishment that they never saw the son of the tyrant, 
the pretext of the trouble imposed upon them, and one 
day complained at not knowing "whether they were guard- 
ing stones or anything else." ^ 

If, in lieu of proofs, these detailed statements authorise 
us to admit that the son of Louis XVI left the Temple 
on Simon's departure for an unknown destination and 
was replaced in his prison by another child, all the 
peripetia, of which a summary sketch follows, succeed 
each other and link together intelligently. If, on the 
contrary, we persist in thinking that the Dauphin was 
still there, that it was indeed he over whom Laurent 
watched rigorously, we must give up trying to discern 
any relation whatsoever between the various episodes com- 
posing the end of the history the Temple and the chron- 

^Regarding these incidents see Barbey, loc. cit. • 

'National Archives, F', 4768. 
'Barbey, loc. cit. 

202 



ENIGMAS 

ological juxtaposition of which would form in that case 
the most extravagant of imbroglios. 

The first of these episodes, as regards date, was the 
abduction, or, to speak more exactly, the transfer of 
the little prisoner during the month following the 9th 
of Thermidor. Barras, as we shall see, had long before 
that famous date, undertaken to remove the children 
of Louis XVI from prison and place them in a residence 
more suitable to their age and the dignity of the Re- 
public. He had paid for this promise by the loss of 
certain assistants indispensable in the preparation of 
his campaign against Robespierre. Up to this point, 
nothing but what is admissible, because what surprises 
us is not the attempts made to assure the two children 
a less wretched and less unjust lot, but, on the contrary, 
the obstinacy of those — if any of them were sincere — 
who demanded indefinite imprisonment for those in- 
offensive orphans. Barras' plan was not to effect the 
removal of the prisoners clandestinely; it was to be done 
with the tacit consent and connivance of certain of his 
friends of the Convention and Laurent had been chosen 
to prepare the means discreetly. 

But the unexpected and astounding discovery made by 
the Creole that the child left in the Temple was not the 
King's son, placed Barras in a position of extreme per- 
plexity. What was he going to do? Declare the sub- 
stitution accomplished? That was not to be thought of, 
for the confession would have lowered France in the eyes 
of her enemies. Policy, if not straightforwardness, 
commanded him to act as though the substitution had 
passed unobserved, to hand over to the constitutionalists, 
as promised, the prisoner of the Temple as they had 
inherited him from the defunct Commune, even if noth- 
ing were mentioned about it, in the hope that, by gain- 
ing time, the true Dauphin would come into the open 
before the trickery of his ad mterim, replacement had 
been noised abroad. Barras decided, therefore, to keep 

203 



THE DAUPHIN 

to himself the secret revealed to him by Laurent ; re- 
serving the right of using it, if need be, to the best of his 
personal interest. But this comedy forbade that Marie 
Therese, as had been agreed upon, should be taken out 
of the Temple at the same time as her pseudo-brother: 
it was necessary, indeed, to prevent the inevitable scandal 
which would result from her reunion with an unknown 
boy. It was, then, of the utmost importance not to leave 
empty at the Temple the place of the child they were 
going to remove, and to place there another substitute 
whom they would choose still more taciturn than the 
first. 

We know not a single circumstance of this suspicious 
combination. The date of the removal is not indicated; 
but it must be fixed prior to the 14th of Fructidor — 
August 31st, 1794.^ As to its reality, to cast doubt on 
it, it would be necessary to reject a document the author- 
ity of which it is difficult to contest, and which is no 
other than the report of a secret sitting of the Directory,^ 

*This is the reason. On that day, August 31st, marked by the 
explosion of the Crenelle powder-magazine, which shook all Paris, 
the Temple received, at ten o'clock in the morning, the visit of two 
delegates of the Committee of General Safety, Andre Dumont and 
Goupilleau de Fontenay (National Archives, F', 4392). Two months 
later, Goupilleau returned to inspect the prison, in company this 
time with his colleague Reverchon. The latter reappeared at the 
Temple on December 19th, with the Members of the Convention 
Mathieu and Harmand of the Meuse. Now, unless we are to suppose 
that all these legislators were accomplices in the abduction, we must 
believe that the child who was presented to them on August 31st 
and October 28th was the same, since Goupilleau was present on 
both occasions ; and that the one shown on October 28th and December 
19th did not differ either, otherwise Reverchon, who saw him on 
these two dates, would have been struck with the dissimilarity. 
Therefore between August 31st and December 19th there had not 
been a substitution; later the supervision of the Temple was 
strengthened and Laurent had an assistant. One cannot, therefore, 
see that the abduction was possible except during August, 1794, when 
Laurent was alone in the Temple. 

'That of April 28th, 1796. The report of this sitting was published 
in full by the Revue historique for May-June, 1918. The Tery title of 
this review, as well as the names of its directors, are a suflBcient 
guarantee of the authenticity of the documents it reproduces. How- 
ever, the one we are going to analyse is so extraordinary, so much at 
variance with what we believed we knew of revolutionary history that 

204 



ENIGMAS 

in the course of which we see the five directors, Carnot, 
Rewbel, La Revelliere, Lepeaux, Letourneur and Bar- 
ras, talking of the abduction of the Dauphin as an 
established fact and approved by them all. All five had 
formed part at various periods, of the Committees of 
the Convention,^ so that they knew thoroughly what 
was going on behind the scenes in politics and the in- 
trigues of all sorts arising for several years past from 
the conflict of parties, one after the other triumphant 
and conquered. Now, at the secret sitting they spoke 
amongst themselves of a certain banker named Petitval, 
a very honest man, according to unanimous opinion, 
and into whose coffers Barras dipped deeply "when it 
was necessary to prepare the Thermidorian revolution." ^ 
He had, in fact, in order to overthrow Robespierre, 
"bought" a certain number of members of the Con- 
vention, and Petitval had certainly guided him in this 

we regret we do not know in what public or private archives it was 
discovered. As the erudite M. Leonce Grasilier has said {Interme- 
diaire des chercheurs et curi&ux, Vol. LXXVIII, No. 1486, col. 107) : 
"Why not tell us the origin of this manuscript, its regular trans- 
mission from hand to hand with justificative documents?" I do 
not doubt the good faith of the publisher of this report, but that 
of Barras remains eminently suspicious. Was he not just the man 
to preserve in his files "fantastic" documents, in order that their 
posthumous publication would retaliate on adversaries whom he had 
not dared, through prudence, to attack during his lifetime? As far 
as the Louis XVII question is concerned, this document fits in 
exactly with what we know of Barras' behaviour at the Temple. 
Nevertheless, until the light promised us has been completely thrown 
on its authenticity we must only utilise it under reserve. 

^Public Safety": Carnot, from August 14th, 1793, to 15th of 
Vendemiaire, year III, and from the 15th of Brumaire, year III, to 
the 15th of Ventose of the same year. La Revelliere-Lepeaux, from 
the 15th of Fructidor year II to 4th of Brumaire, year IV. Le- 
tourneur (of the Manche) from the 15th of Thermidor, year III 
to the 4th of Brumaire, year IV. General Safety: Rewbel, from the 
15th of Vendemiaire to the 15th of Pluviose, year. III. Letourneur 
(of the Manche), from the 15th of Thermidor, year III, to the 4th 
of Brumaire, year IV. Barras, from the 15th of Brumaire to the 
15th of Vent6se year III, and from the 15th of Fructidor, year III, 
to the 4th of Brumaire, year IV. Le personnel des Comites de 
Salut Public et de Surete Generale Etudes revolutionnaires by 
James Guillaume, 3nd series. 

^Revue historique, May-June, 1918, p. 76. 

205 



THE DAUPHIN 

delicate manoeuvre, b€ing the possessor of the list of those 
representatives of the people "who received subsidies 
from England." ^ Blefore dying, Louis XVI had handed 
his instructions concerning his son to M. de Malesherbes, 
he, in his turn, had entrusted to Petitval, whom he held 
in high esteem, the care of "collecting sums due to the 
Royal family" ; ^ and, in return for the pecuniary 
assistance given in "the operation" of Thermidor, Petitval 
had obtained the promise that the Dauphin should stay 
with him at the Chateau de Vitry. Barras and "his 
friends" had consented to this, on condition that the 
child should "always remain at the disposal of the Con- 
vention" and that precautions be taken "to prevent him 
being abducted." ^ If they had not left him at the 
Temple, it was "because he could not receive there the 
care his condition demanded." ^ And, on the other 
hand, "they could not set the son of Louis XVI at com- 
plete liberty." ^ Barras had distinctly declared it "to 
the representative of the Right on the eve of Ther- 
midor," ^ when, doubtless, they demanded the little King's 
deliverance as the price of their co-operation. 

This confession from Barras was very favourably re- 
ceived by his colleagues of the Directory. Nobody ap- 
peared surprised at it or took it amiss : he told them 
nothing they did not know and of which they did not 
approve. Honest La Revelliere considered "that it was 
contrary to the republican principle to imprison the 
children of Louis XVI ; the measure could not be justi- 
fied from any point of view; they ought not to make 
these children suffer for the faults of their parents ; 
their imprisonment could not last for ever; they had 
always been under an obligation to bring it to an end." ^ 

^Bevue historique, May-June, 1918, p. 80. 

^The same, loc. cit., p. 75. 

'The same. 

*The same. 

The same. 

The same. 

'The same, loc. cit., p. 75. 

g06 



ENIGMAS 

Rewbel also expressed his opinion, saying: "I claim to 
be as good a republican as anybody ; but I have a strong 
objection to the persecution of women and children," ^ 
and La Revelliere concluded, "we perceive to-day how 
fatal the policy of the old governmental Committee 
has been; all our embarrassments arise from that 
policy." ^ 

Thus, then, according to the declaration of Barras 
himself and the affirmative testimony of his four col- 
leagues, the child of the Temple had been, since the end 
of August, 1794, with Petitval at the Chateau de Vitry, 
a fine building, dating barely twenty years back, stand- 
ing in the midst of an extensive park enclosed by walls. ^ 
Who, then, was Laurent guarding so jealously at the 
Temple? What child did he exhibit to the members of 
the Committee of General Safety who, from time to time, 
inspected the prison? Were they all then in the secret? 
If the replacing of the disappeared Dauphin by a sub- 

^Bevue Mstorique, loc. cit., p. 77. 

^The secret sitting was continued by a conversation on other sub- 
jects to which we shall have to return later. But, before leaving 
this report, it is not without utility to note its precision: the most 
insignificant interruption on the part of interlocutors is noted therein. 
Manifestly this conversation was taken down by a stenographer. 
None of the five directors was obliged to do this work, so that a 
secretary must have been admitted to the conversation and thereby 
the secret of those confidences was to a great extent compromised. 
How is it that it was never noised abroad? How is it that La 
Revelliere makes no allusion, in his Memoirs, to the very serious 
fact revealed to him? How is it that it is not referred to in the 
Memoires sur Carnot? How is it that, at the time of the Restoration, 
when Letourneur was exiled to Brussels, he did not confide it to his 
former colleagues, proscripts like himself and, like himself, full 
of rancour against Louis XVHI? And what a piece of imprudence 
this King committed in banishing men who were in possession of the 
secret of his usurpation ! In this bewildering history of Louis XVII, 
every time an apparently precise and genuine document appears we 
are obliged to regard it with suspicion, so many problems more 
insoluble than those it elucidates does it raise. 

^The Chateau de Vitry was sold in 1905 and the estate divided into 
lots. The interior of the chateau was decorated in the most charming 
Louis XVI style. Several motifs of its wainscotings and paintings 
were photographed, before their destruction, by the Commission 
de Vieux, Paris, and were reproduced in its Bulletin. 

207 



THE DAUPHIN 

stitute explains in a satisfactory manner the isolation 
imposed on that wretched child, it is very difficult to 
admit that the members of the Convention allowed them- 
selves to be deceived, one after the other, with so much 
docility. 

These visits of the representatives of the people to 
the prison were for many months the only incidents the 
certainty of which we can attest. All the rest is legend 
or romance. Borrowing from only incontestably 
authentic documents, the history of the prisoner of the 
Temple becomes smaller and poorer from day to day. On 
the 14th of Fructidor (August 31st), two members of 
the Committee of General Safety called at the prison 
at about ten in the morning. They came to make sure 
that the explosion of the Grenelle powder-magazine, 
which put the whole city in a flutter, "had in no way 
troubled the tranquillity and safety of the Temple." ^ 
According to a letter from Laurent, dated the same 
day, they visited the Tower, "ascertained the existence 
of the two children of Capet," * and gave orders to double 
the guard, which was done immediately and with the 
greatest zeal by a detachment of the section of the 
Temple. Laurent profited by their presence to ask for 
an authorisation "to introduce trustworthy men into little 
Capet's apartment, in order to clean it and rid it of 
the vermin occasioned by neglect." ^ Thus, in spite of 
the formal instructions on which Barras prided himself, 
they had waited for more than a month before carrying 
out the cleaning. Waited for what.^* Until a fresh 
substitution was effected? . . . 

A month later, on September 28th — the second day 
of the sans-cidottides — little Capet was spoken of from the 
Tribune of the Convention. In consequence of the read- 
ing of a letter from the provinces, announcing a rising 

^National Archives, Y\ 6492, 

-\s it trifling to note that Laurent writes existence and not identity? 

^National Archives, F\ 6492. 

208 



ENIGMAS 

in the name of Louis XVII, Jourdan, (of the Nievre) 
asked why there still existed at the heart of the Republic 
"a rallying-point for the aristocracy." — "The Capetian 
foetus" served as a pretext for execrable exploits on the 
part of wicked men ; and Duhem, going one better, ex- 
pressed astonishment "that a people who had had the 
courage to send its tyrant to the scaffold still preserved 
in its bosom his offspring, heir presumptive of Royalty." 
He therefore proposed that little Capet be "vomited" 
outside French territory, whereupon the Assembly re- 
ferred the question to its committees.^ This made Laurent 
somewhat uneasy, for if the convention decreed the 
banishment of the little prince and his sister, what would 
happen on the day when they solemnly came to the 
Temple to verify — seriously this time — the prisoner's 
identity before handing him over to the foreign powers.'' 
Either because he was well advised or because of his own 
accord, he considered it urgent to guard his responsi- 
bility; as soon as he obtained knowledge of Duhem's 
proposition, he wrote to the Committee of General Safety 
setting forth that, since his arrival at the Temple, he 
had several times asked for the assistance of one or two 
colleagues and had never received any reply. "Now 
that there is talk of Royalists, and as precautions cannot 
be carried too far," he renewed his earnest entreaties. 
"If some event should happen at this moment," he added, 
"I could not inform you of it myself. . . ." The Com- 
mittee paid no attention to this missive, although it was 
almost threatening. The prisoner of the Temple was 
evidently the least of its cares. Everything here smacks 
of a comedy arranged between Laurent and the Com- 
mittee — or at least some influential person on the 
Committee, for never before was there encountered such 
barefaced freedom in the case of a subordinate and such 
complete carelessness on the part of responsible rulers. 

^Moniteur. Reprint, Vol. XXI, pp. 799 and 800, 

209 



THE DAUPHIN 

Despite the inconvenience we feel in entangling so 
many intrigues, the chronological order of facts here 
necessitates the introduction of new actors who, like so 
many others, will appear on the stage, play confusedly 
a bit of a part and disappear as disappointed and 
abashed as the preceding personages in this obscure his- 
tory. A rich and enterprising English lady, Lady Atkins, 
having formerly succeeded in entering the Queen^s cell 
when she was at the Conciergerie, had sworn to the 
sovereign to attempt to deliver the Dauphin by every 
possible means. On returning to England, she took 
active steps to carry out her promise, and perhaps she 
acted with more ardour and devotion than method. Lady 
Atkins was intimately connected with Comte Louis de 
Frotte, the valiant promotor of the insurrections in 
Normandy ; she had also "engaged" in her attempt Baron 
de Cormier, the former attorney general to the Presi- 
dent of Rennes, a determined and enterprising man, in 
spite of his gout and corpulency. Such were the two con- 
fidants of the generous Englishwoman, the two strong 
heads of the plot.^ Now, after numerous conferences, 
much groping about, abortive plans, and combinations 
abandoned as quickly as they were conceived, Cormier 
at the beginning of that month of October, 1794 sent the 
following cry of triumph to his employer: "I must write 
you a few words in haste. ... I believe I am able to 
assure you^ declare to you most positively that the 
Master and his property are saved; and that undoubt- 
edly . . . share my security ; I can give no details ; it 
is only full in the face that I can open my heart to 
you. . . ." The happy news which he announced to 
Lady Atkins in these ambiguous terms he repeated a few 
days later to Frotte, as proved by a letter from Frotte 
himself as follows : — "Cormier tells me that you are the 

^The details of this complicated story need not be related here, 
since Lady Atkins found W. H. Frederic Barbey a historian as 
conscientious as he is erudite. See Madame Atkins et la prison du 
Temple, 1758-1836. D'apres des documents inddits. Perrin, M. 

210 



ENIGMAS 

only one to whom I can speak frankly. ... I speak to 
you as to a friend whose loyalty and sacrifices I know 
. . . everything is arranged; in short I give you my 
word that the King and France are saved . . . and we 
ought to be happy." ^ 

We are moved to pity by the anguish, hopes, decep- 
tions and joys of these naive conspirators, who exercise 
their wits and bestir themselves, imagining they are 
risking their heads, squandering Lady Atkins' guineas 
by thousands, buying consciences, freighting ships, cor- 
rupting jailors and wasting their strength in transports 
of impatience on account of a child who was not the little 
king for whose safety they had expended so many efforts. 
After a whole year of delays, disappointments, certainty 
of approaching success, deceptions and perplexities, 
Cormier was obliged to confess to the noble English- 
woman; "we have been deceived. That is unfortunately 
too certain. . . ." And it indeed appears that Lady 
Atkins saw clearly into the intrigue which ruined her 
hopes without, however, quite awakening her from her 
dream, since she wrote: "I was much opposed to putting 
another child in the King's place. I pointed out to my 
friends that that might have grievous consequences and 
that those who then governed, after having touched the 
money, would abduct the august child and say afterwards 
that he had never left the Temple." ^ And still later, 
fully convinced that the son of Louis XVI was no longer 
in prison, she said sadly, thinking of all her sacrifices : 
"A higher power than mine took possession of him." ^ 
Had she then guessed the plot of which she believed 
Barras was the beneficiary, whereas he was only, he also, 
a dupe.'' He, at least, bore his disappointment with 
superb audaciously played pluck. He had been kept 

^Letter from Comte Louis de Frotte, published in accordance with 
the original by R. P. Delaporte, S. J., Etudes, October, 1893. 

^Note in Lady Atkins' handwriting at the bottom of a letter from 
Cormier. F. Barbey, loc cit, p. 167. 

=Barbey, p. 22S. 

211 



THE DAUPHIN 

acquainted by Laurent with all the attempts made by 
Lady Atkins' agents, and quite sure that these would 
not abduct the Dauphin from the Temple, since he had 
not been there for a long time past, he amused himself 
with letting them continue. "They offered," he said, 
"a fairly large sum of money to Laurent, who, moreover, 
refused it ; and this sum was offered to him when the 
child had already left the prison." ^ 

However, something must have been noised abroad. 
Although too often put to the test and always disap-- 
pointed, curiosity was, in the end, wearied; although the 
silence imposed on the little King, whom people never 
saw and to whom the Gazettes no longer made any allu- 
sion, had diverted attention from him, there came so 
many people to the Temple — two hundred and forty 
soldiers mounted guard there daily — and Laurent, paid 
six thousand livres per annum to live in apparent laziness, 
created so many jealous ones, that, among the number 
someone was to be found who perceived that strange 
things were happening in that silent prison. On October 
28th, 1794, two urgent letters from the administrative 
Commission of the Paris police were received by the Com- 
mittee of General Safety. We are in ignorance of their 
contents, because up to the present, despite active re- 
search, they have not been found.^ The matter must 
have been of importance, because the Committee dis- 
patched, at dead of night, two of its members, Reverchon 
and Goupilleau de Fontenay, to proceed to the Temple 
immediately, to verify and make certain of the presence 
of the two prisoners . . . and take measures which the 

^The report already cited, Revue historique, p. 71, "Who tried to 
corrupt Laurent?" asked La Revelliere-Lepeaux. "A lawyer named 
Lalliment, who played in this intrigue the part of a simple commis- 
sioner," replied Barras. 

="The Committee of General Safety, deliberating on two letters 
from the Administrative Commission of the Paris police charges 
two of its members". . . etc. National Archives, A. F. 11* 276. Fol. 
744. F. Barbey, Christophe Laurent gardien de Louis XVII, Revue 
of September 15th, 1909, 



ENIGMAS 

public safety appeared to demand. How did Laurent 
receive them? Did he introduce them to the presence of 
his boarder? Did the child — perhaps asleep — arouse no 
suspicion in their minds? We do not know. Through 
Madame Royale alone are we partially informed con- 
cerning the circumstances of that unusual inspection. 
"At the end of October," she writes, "whilst I was asleep 
at one in the morning, they opened my door. I rose 
and opened (sic) ^ to see two men of the Committee 
enter with Laurent. They looked at me and left without 
a word." What anomaly was it which disquieted the two 
members of the Convention, in the course of their visit 
to the lower floor, to such an extent as to make them 
show such laconic haste in the apartment of the female 
prisoner? This awakening of a young girl at dead of 
night, without a word of excuse or explanation, and the 
silence kept the next day on the subject of this visit by 
Laurent, ordinarily so obliging and so attentive towards 
the prisoner, — who must, however, have questioned him, — 
indicate at least astonishment, if not emotion, the cause of 
which is unrevealed by the report of the delegates of the 
Committee. All that we see is that, on their report, the 
Committee of General Safety "requested the commander 
of the Parisian armed force to give the most severe orders 
to prevent even the appearcmce of the possibility of an 
escape," and this next purposely obscure, merely shows 
that the alarm had been a sudden one. 

Laurent got off, however, without damage. Only, it 
was decided that within a delay of two days "a tried 
Republican" should be appointed to assist him in his 
work and, henceforth, the Civil Committees of the 
Parisian sections should send by turns to the Temple 
one of their members to mount guard there during twenty- 

^There were two folding doors between the anteroom and Madame 
Royale's bedroom. Doubtless we must understand here that, on 
hearing the first door open, the prisoner got out of bed to open that 
which was on the side of her room and which, perhaps, she was able 
to bolt. 

213 



THE DAUPHIN 

four hours ; "but in such a way that each of these com- 
missioners would not be on duty more than once a year," ^ 
a singular precaution, the reasons for which remain as 
obscure as the other incidents of that nocturnal visit. 
The service of civilian commissioners began immedi- 
ately. From October 29th the members of the sections 
came one after the other to weary themselves during 
twenty-four hours on the ground floor of the tower. But 
the "tried republican" did not arrive until November 8th. 
He was a little middle-class citizen of thirty-eight years 
of age, a Parisian by birth named Gomin, and if we 
can be astonished by anything in this inexplicable his- 
tory, it is by this, that the Committee of General Safety 
was unable in ten days to find, in the whole of Paris, a 
republican more "tried" than he. Although he had been, 
according to his own confession, commander of the bat- 
talion of the Fraternite section, never was man more 
timid or showed a greater disposition to keep in the back- 
ground. Even after the long and frequent conversations 
which he granted about 1837 to Beauchesne, the most 
celebrated of the historians of Louis XVII, and to whom 
Gomin "revealed the ancient troubles of his soul by lay- 
ing bare his conscience," we are in ignorance, we know 
nothing, absolutely nothing of his past, unless it is that 
he lived in the Rue Saint-Louis en I'Isle and that his 
father was an upholsterer. The history of Gomin 
might end there ; if we set on one side everything the 
chroniclers have attributed to him, we find but the de- 
sire to pass unperceived, reticences, slyness and contra- 
dictions. We do not even know who recommended him 
to the Committee of General Safety,^ or how to explain 
his appointment. Madame Royale speaks of Gomin as 
of a very honest man to whom the state of the little 

^A. FII* 276, fol. 744. 

''He told Beauchesne that long afterward he learnt that he had 
been recommended to the Committee of General Safety by a certain 
Marquis de Fenouil, living on the Isle Saint-Louis. . . . The inter- 
vention of a marquis in this matter appears somewhat surprising. 

214. 



ENIGMAS 

prisoner caused from the very first so much pain "that 
he wished to send in his resignation immediately.'* He 
remained "to alleviate the torments of the wretched 
child," whom he sought to amuse daily for a few hours. 
"He had him come down to his room below, in the little 
drawing room, which pleased my brother very much," 
she adds, "because he liked a change of place"; — all 
things which the princess heard only through Gomin 
himself. He related only what he wished and we should 
very much like to know the artifices adopted by this 
most kind man to divert the princess' desire to see the 
boy whom she believed was her brother. If the child 
loved "a change of place" so much, why did they not 
let him ascend the steps which separated his room from 
that of the princess, and why was Gomin a docile party, 
from the very first day of his duty, to that rigorous 
regulation to keep the children separated which nobody 
had imposed, — since, on the contrary, an order was again 
given to reunite them.f* 

This happened on December 19th. On that day three 
members of the Committee, Mathieu, Reverchon and 
Harmand of the Meuse arrived at the Temple "in order 
to ascertain the truth about the state of the service." 
One of them, Harmand, has left a long account of this 
visit which would be a document of the first importance 
had he not written it twenty-two years later at the time 
of the Restoration and become very anxious not to say 
anything which might displease the Government. This 
account becomes, therefore, eminently suspicious owing 
to its foregone conclusion expressed in an apologetic tone. 
The delegates of the Committee of General Safety did not 
show, in 1794, even after Thermidor, so much sensi- 
bility and indignation. First of all, Harmand is in error 
regarding the date. He fixes his visit to the Temple 
"in the early days of the month of Pluviose, year III, 
which corresponded with February, 1795," but it took 
place two months before, December 19th, 1794. He 

215 



THE DAUPHIN 

errs more complacently regarding the emotion he felt on 
entering the royal prison. He cannot have either gone 
"so pale" or have felt his "heart beat so fast," or have 
made so many efforts to keep back his tears, or have 
shown such obsequious politeness to the prisoners. But 
certain topographical details are certainly correct. "Al- 
ready we had ascended a few steps of the staircase of 
the Tower on the west of the horrible prison when a 
lamentable voice, coming through a wicket placed on 
this staircase, and which announced rather the lair of 
an unclean animal than that of a man, arrested our 
progress. . ., . That voice made on my colleagues and 
myself an effect that nothing can express. We stopped, 
questioned each other and learnt that that cell, that dark 
prison, enclosed a former valet of King Louis XVI. I 
have forgotten his name." 

It was Tison ; Tison buried for the past fifteen months 
in a garret of the little tower without either himself 
or anj'body else knowing the reason for his imprisonment ! 
Harmand continues : "I certify that the fact was abso- 
lutely unknown to the Government Committees. Tlie 
prisoner set forth his complaint and demanded his free- 
dom. We pointed out to him that our powers did not 
extend as far as that. He then asked at least to be 
granted a change of place provisionally, and to this 
we consented not only without difficulty but with tears 
in our eyes. . . ." These members of the Convention, if 
we are to believe them — during the Restoration! — were 
the most sensitive of men. 

But when Harmand is not shedding tears, his narra- 
tive assumes a fairly accurate tone. We may accept 
his description of the prisoner's room, which was no 
other than that formerly occupied by Louis XVI.-^ "The 
key turned in the lock noisily and on the door opening 

'After the cleaning of Clary's old room, where the child appears 
to have been shut up for six months, he must then have been put 
into his father's former room. Harmand's description can apply 
only to that room. 

216 



ENIGMAS 

we saw a small and very tidy anteroom without any 
other piece of furniture in it than a china stove, which 
communicated with a neighbouring room by an opening 
in a partition and which could not be lighted except in 
that anteroom. The Commissioners pointed out to us 
that this precaution had been taken so as not to allow 
the child access to the firCi The other room was the 
prince's. It was fastened from the outside and had also 
to be opened. . . . The prince was sitting at a little 
square table on which many playing cards were scat- 
tered. Some were folded into the shape of boxes, whilst 
others formed castles. He was occupied with his cards 
when we entered and did not leave off his game. He 
was wearing a new sailor jacket of slate-coloured cloth. 
He was bare-headed. The room was clean and well- 
lighted. The bed consisted of a wooden couch without 
curtains, and the bed linen appeared to us fine and good. 
The bed was behind the door, to the left on entering. 
Further off, on the same side, was another wooden bed 
without linen, placed at the foot of the first. A closed 
door between the two communicated with another room 
we did not see." ^ 

If we are to place faith in the remainder of the nar- 
rative, we are forced to conclude that the child shown 
to the members of the Convention was deaf and dumb. 
Neither objurgation, nor order, nor earnest entreaty 
succeeded in dragging a single word from him. For more 
than an hour the three delegates of the Committee strove 
to obtain a "yes" or a "no" from him. They proposed 
to him games, cakes, the company of a companion of 
his own age, walks in the garden, a dog, and birds. They 
had recourse to supplications, pointing out to him that 
by his obstinacy he made the carrying out of their mis- 
sion very difficult. But he merely looked at them with 
an astonishing fixity which expressed the greatest indif- 

^This door opened on to the corridor leading to the wardrobe. See 
plan p. 18. 

217 



THE DAUPHIN 

ference. They brought him in his supper, composed, 
writes Harmand, "of black soup covered with a few 
lentils, a small piece of boiled beef from the soup and 
six burnt chestnuts," — in which respect his memory de- 
ceived him, for the menu at the Temple that day con- 
sisted of eggs, a piece of meat and potatoes, salsify and 
fruit. ^ The child ate in the presence of the representa- 
tives but still kept absolute silence. "His features did 
not change for a single moment; there was not the least 
apparent emotion, nor the least astonishment in his eyes, 
as though we had not been there." ^ 

At last the members of the Convention withdrew. They 
remained "in the anteroom for a quarter of an hour, 
exchanging their reflexions," coming to the conclusion 
that, "for the honour of the nation, which was in ig- 
norance of this matter, for that of the Convention which, 
in truth, was also ignorant of it, but whose duty it was 
to hear of it, they would not make a public report but 
one only to a secret committee," — ^which was accordingly 
done Harmand adds. Before leaving the Temple and 
at the request of Madame Royale, who asked for news 
of her brother, he ordered that the two children should 
be allowed to communicate with each other as often as 
they liked. "The Government showed the greatest zeal 
in carrying out the promises we made in its name and in 
realising the hopes we expressed, at least that was de- 
creed the same evening. I was to have been entrusted 
with the carrying out of those details but an intrigue 
resulted in my being appointed Commissioner to the East 
Indies and I left a few days afterwards without knowing 

^Lienard's accounts enumerate for the 29th of Frimaire, year III 
(December 19th, 1794) — Two dozen eggs, 3 livres; milk, 15 sols; 23 
lbs. of meat, 19 livres 11 sols; 1 bushel of potatoes, 2 livres 15 sols; 2 
bundles of sersifi (sic) 2 livres 5 sols. On the previous day, December 
18th, he brought 5 lbs. of fresh pork, cauliflowers, spinach, turnips, 
fish, fruit, and 314 pints of milk. It must be said — and this would 
enable the menu given by Harmand to be accepted, — that in Bru- 
maire, Lienard bought 121/3 bushels, that is 156 litres, of lentils, evi- 
dently as a reserve for the winter. 

'Anecdotes, p. 182. 

218 



ENIGMAS 

whether the young prince had spoken in his interviews 
with his august sister as is probable." Thus the Com- 
mittee ordered that the children of Louis XVI should 
"communicate with each other," and they never did so. 
There was, therefore, some one who intercepted as far 
as the Temple was concerned, the decrees of the Gov- 
ernment, or who had them annulled. 

We should credit Harmand of the Meuse with little 
perspicacity if we hesitated for a single moment to be- 
lieve that he left the Temple convinced of the substitution 
of a deaf and dumb child for the Dauphin. His despatch 
to the East Indies ^ must have confirmed his conviction 
that this was a way of asking him to be discreet.^ So 
he kept silence until 1814 and if at that time he spoke 
in veiled and reticent terms, it was merely to show that 
he was not deceived but knew how to keep a secret. This 
skill did not profit the former member of the Convention. 
Towards the end of 1815 he was found dying of starva- 
tion in the streets of Paris and died on being taken to 
the Hotel Dieu.^ What a pity that we cannot consider 
as completely worthy of faith the only authorised nar- 
rative we possess of a visit to the Temple during the 
period which elapsed between Simon's departure and the 
approaching death of the prisonetr! Who was that 
unfortunate boy described by Harmand? A dumb child? 
That is possible. Barras was sufficiently cunning to 
have ordered his agents to take this extra precaution. 
In any case, there is a somewhat striking analogy between 
the narrative of Harmand of the Meuse and the declara- 
tion of Lasne, the last custodian of the Temple, whom 
we shall soon see entering on the scene, testifying, in 
1814, before the Tribunal of the Seine that "the prince 

^He was chosen for this mission on the 3rd of Ventose (February 
21st, 1795). Moniteur, Reprint, Vol. XXIII, page 532. 

''Barras, chosen the same day to accompany him to India {Moni- 
teur, Reprint, the same) did not leave Paris. Harmand, moreover, 
only went as far as Brest, where he remained some time. 

^Biographie Moderne, 1816. 

219 



THE DAUPHIN 




Petite Tour Grosse Tour 

ELEVATION OF THE TOWERS OF THE TEMPLE 
and arrangement of the places occupied by the Royal Family from 1792 to 1796 

220 



ENIGMAS 



EXPLANATIONS 

A. Door and turret of the main staircase of the Little and Big 
Tower. 

B. Little Tower. Dining room. 

C. Ditto. Bedroom of the Queen and Dauphin from August 
14th until October 25th, 1792. It was in this room that the child 
prisoner died June 8th, 1795. 

D. Ditto. Kitchen where Madame Elizabeth and Pauline de Tour- 
zel lived during the early days of their captivity. 

E. Ditto. The attic. 

F. Big Tower. Windows of the Council Room. 

G. Ditto. Guard-room. 

H. Ditto. Anteroom of the King's floor. It was in this room 
that the examination of the Dauphin took place on October 6th, 
17th, 1793, and also there that the doctors made the autopsy of the 
little prisoner on June 9th, 1795. 

J. Ditto. Window of Louis XVI bedroom, afterwards inhabited, 
from July 3rd, 1793, until January 19th, 1794, by the Simon household 
and the Dauphin. It was there that the child prisoner remained 
sequestered from July 28th, 1794, until June 9th, 1795. 

K. Ditto. Window of Louis XVI oratory. 

L. Ditto. Anteroom of the Queen's floor. 

M. Ditto. Marie Antoinette's room, then that of Madame Eliza- 
beth and Madame Royale and finally that of the latter alone until 
December, 1795. 

N. Ditto. The Queen's cabinet de toilette. 

O. Ditto. Upper floor of the Western turret and barred windows 
through which the Queen was able to see her son when taken for a 
walk by Simon on the platform of the Tower. 

P. Ditto. Promenade. The crenelles were blocked up by blinds in 
March, 1793. 



221 



THE DAUPHIN 

shewed extraordinary impassibility; he uttered no com- 
plaint and never broke the silence." ^ As to Gomin, in 
1834, at the Assize Court, he affirmed that the little 
prisoner spoke daily and always "on serious and lofty 
subjects." 

"Those conversations," he added, "left a profound im- 
pression on my memory. ... I should surprise the 
Court if I cared to repeat what he said to me." We 
have the impression on placing these testimonies side by 
side, that some one is lying; that there are things we do 
not know and never shall know. Between the nine-year- 
old Bossuet evoked by Gomin and the taciturn and ob- 
stinate child of his associate, whom are we to choose.'' 

Dumb or not matters little. There, on the second floor 
of the Tower, was a child who replaced another, the one 
who had been abducted from the Temple and placed at 
Vitry. And why was never a word spoken of the latter? 
Were those who thought they had saved, in him, the son 
of the King of France, also deceived.'* Did they recognise 
that they had been forestalled; that, long before the 
9th of Thermidor, the true Dauphin had already disap- 
peared, hidden — like so many other children made orphans 
by the emigration or the scaifold, — hidden in some popu- 
lous faubourg, or in the depths of a distant province 
with rough and ignorant people incapable of understand- 
ing his protests and complaints, and that Chaumette being 
dead — Chaumette who wished "to make little Capet lose 
the idea of his rank," and who perhaps succeeded in doing 
so, — nobody knows any longer the lot of the little phan- 
tom king whom, since January 21st, all parties succes- 
sively made the secret axis of their policy and who was 
the allurement of so many ambitions. 

^However, according to Lasne himself, the prisoner spoke once, 
during the last days of his life. 



222 



VI 



OUTSIDE THE TEMPLE 



It was exactly at this period that France began to 
understand the value of the part played by the fragile 
hostage of the Temple in her destiny and the importance 
of the traffic in which he might be the price. This con- 
viction had, as we have seen, been handed down by party 
leaders and concealed from each other for a long time ; 
but the bulk of the assembly, the chorus of naive and sim- 
ple men, in whom the very word King inspired a horror 
as factitious as it was blind, had only become aware since 
Thermidor that the country possessed a guarantee by 
which it would be wise to profit. Calmed and made wise 
by abundant bleedings, the Convention suddenly revealed 
a moderate disposition, whilst refusing to confess the fact, 
and it was in Vendee that it first of all tried a policy of 
clemency. On the 12th of Frimaire, year III (December 
2nd, 1794) it voted an amnesty for "all those rebels of 
the west who would lay down their arms within a month," 
and appointed commissioners to carry out that decree in 
Brittany and Lower Poitou. 

In French history there is hardly a more touching epi- 
sode than the meeting on February 12, 1795, at the Cha- 
teau de la Jaunaie, near Nantes, between the delegates 
of the Convention and Charette, accompanied by his gen- 
erals. The representatives of the people proceeded to the 
place fixed for the interview escorted by a hundred horse 
soldiers and two hundred foot soldiers, commanded by 
General in chief Canclaux, followed by the whole of his 
staff. A tent having been erected on the heath at the 
"Lion d'Or," the members of the Convention, with tri- 



THE DAUPHIN 

colour plumes in their hats and scarves across their 
breasts, sat down in a row at a long table, and imme- 
diately Charette was announced, his three hundred horse- 
men massing themselves in front of the soldiers of the 
Republic. As he entered the tent, he was seen to be wear- 
ing a little flesh-coloured jacket with red collar and cuffs 
and facings figured with fleurs-de-lys. Below his belt 
was a broad piece of black lace; on his jacket, over his 
heart, was embroidered a crucifix with the legend, Vous 
qui vous plaignez, considered mes souff ranees; whilst above 
his hat, ornamented with two gilded bands, waved a bunch 
of white, black and green feathers symbolic of fidelity, 
mourning and hope. Six of his generals, with white 
plumes and white belts, entered behind him and took their 
seats at the other side of the table, facing the deputies. •"■ 

Over this meeting hovered the affecting figure of the 
little King and prisoner for w^hom those men of Vendee 
had fought so long and whose name was embroidered on 
their flags. It was, indeed, towards him that all thoughts 
tended at that solemn moment, for immediately the rumour 
spread outside the tent, at the Chateau de la Jaunaie, 
where the leaders of the insurrection were sumptuously 
entertained at the expense of the republic, in the suburbs 
of Nantes, throughout the town, and soon as far as Paris, 
that, if the gallant general of the royal army would 
consent, without having been conquered, to enter into nego- 
tiations with the delegates of the regicidal Assembly, his 
first demand would be, not tlie immediate re-establishment 
of the Monarchy but the handing over of the children of 
Louis XVI to the faithful Vendee. . . . Now, in reality 
the prisoners of the Temple were not even in question! 

Mystery still hangs over this subject. Not that it is 
permissible to believe in any secret agreement,^ but one 

^Lolficial, representative of the people. Journal d'un Conven- 
tionel en Vendee, published by Monsieur Leroux-Cesbron, grandson 
of LofEcial. 

"The hypothesis of secret clauses has been too often discussed to 
make it necessary to return to it. See an article by La Sicotiere in 

2M 



OUTSIDE THE TEMPLE 

is astonished to see the proud, irascible and stubborn 
Charette so accommodating. From the very first nego- 
tiations, he adopted the formulse of the republican calen- 
dar, the execrated title of Citizen, and spoke with respect 
of the representatives of the people.^ Ruelle, one of the 
delegates of the Convention, — and a regicide ! — became for 
him "the friend of humanity and laAv" ; the other members 
of the Convention were "worthy of esteem and praise"; 
he declared that "never more strongly than in their pres- 
ence had he felt he was French," and that it was "with 
those feelings that he solemnly proclaimed to the National 
Convention and the whole of France his submission to the 
French Republic, one and indivisible." ^ More than that, 
he put on his head a hat with a tricolour feather to make 
triumphal entry into Nantes ! . . . Doubtless Ruelle was 
a clever man and knew how to get round the Vendee 
leader; but so much was not expressed of him, and it was 
owing to seeing him fraternise so warmly with the "blues" 
that several of his officers, unable to believe their own eyes, 
imagined, in order to explain to themselves so sudden 
and so unexpected a change, that their chief had obtained 
from the republicans far more and far better advantages 
than the mediocre ones officially set down in the treaty of 
peace. The legend of the coming surrender of Louis XVlI 
to the Vendee originated at La Jaunaie itself from the 
stupor of the Vendee chiefs, and perhaps Charette himself 
showed a certain complaisance in allowing it to spread. 
Poirier de Beauvais, the general-in-command of the Ven- 
dee artillery, relates that, after the end of the third con- 
ference, finding himself in Charette's room, he dared to 

the Revue des questions historiques for January, 1881, and Chassin's 
Pacification de I'ouest, Vol. I, p. 203 and following pages. Amedee 
de Bejarry, the legal representative of Charette, has always affirmed 
that there were no secret clauses and that no such were even proposed. 
Souvenirs vend^ens, pp. 158 and 159. 

^Moniteur. Reprint, Vol. XXIII, p. 314. A letter from La 
Roberie. Commander of the Vendee cavalry. 

"Moniteur. Reprint, Vol. XXIII, p. 686. Sitting of the Convention 
of the 24th of Ventose (March 15th). 

225 



THE DAUPHIN 

express his surprise "that those who desired peace did 
not, from the first clause, demand the King. . . . Though 
they were to be refused, attachment to the prince's per- 
son and decency made that absolutely necessary. . . ." 
Charette diverted the conversation "with acrimony"; but 
in the evening, at La Beziliere, another leader of the 
Royalist army, M. de la Boiiere, sharing the bed of M. de 
Fleuriot, Charette's uncle, and showing how hard it was for 
the men of Vendee, after having fought for two years 
unceasingly to treat with the King's executioners and the 
jailors of the heir to the throne, Fleuriot confided to him, 
in the greatest secrecy, "that there were clauses agreed 
upon that could not be made known . . . and that, in 
accordance with one of these articles, young Louis XVH 
was to be placed in Charette's hands at the end of June; 
that until then, and in order to succeed therein, the great- 
est circumspection and inviolable secrecy was necessary. 
. . . That was why, during the La Jaunaie discussion, 
the question of the royalty was not mentioned, Charette 
knowing what he was to believe on that subject." ^ 

"The inviolable secret," passing from mouths to ears, 
became a fable throughout Vendee and spread as far as 
Paris. The Convention was concerned; its Committees, 
speculating on its docility, had governed so long without 
it that now, recovering from its fear, it demanded that 
everything "shall be done in the full light of day." A 
coincidence gave rise to comments ; at the very hour the 
delegates of the assembly entered into negotiations with 
Charette, there was being discussed at the Convention the 
question as to whether the republic, when treating with the 
enemy powers, could make engagements which would re- 
main secret for a stated time, whether the Committee of 
Public Safety alone was qualified to countersign these 

^Fourier de Beauvais M4moires, page 327, note. The same inci- 
dent is related almost identically in the recollections of the Comtesse 
de la Boiiere: La guerre de Vendue, p. 189, according to a note by 
the Comte de la Boiifere. 

226 



OUTSIDE THE TEMPLE 

occult conventions.^ And they had a right to demand 
what unrevealed price had been paid for Charette's en- 
gagement to sign his capitulation. The more he showed 
satisfaction, the more uneasy they became ; they strove to 
discover why in that affair he appeared to be the one under 
obligation, and when in a letter addressed to Ruelle, and 
which was read from the Tribune by Boissy I'Anglas, the 
Vendee chief announced that, as a guarantee of his grati- 
tude and attachment, he sent his flags in homage to the 
Convention,^ all the deputies rose and shouted Long live 
the Republic! But they sat down with a vague presenti- 
ment of an immense and mysterious deception ^ and had 
the tact not to introduce at their bar those emissaries 
of the former "rebels" and not to suspend Charette's 
flags from the roof of the chamber — embarrassing 
trophies, indeed, and the white silk of which, adorned with 
fleurs-de-lys and bearing the inscription Long live Louis 
XVII! would have been as much out of place among the 

^See more particularly the sittings of the 22nd, 23rd, and 26th of 
Ventose, year III. Moniteur. Reprint, Vol. XXIII, p. 674 and fol- 
lowing pages. Cambaceres, the reporter, made known the wording 
of the bill to the Assembly at its sitting of the 30th of Ventose: 
Clause I: the Committee of Public Safety . . . Clause III ... is 
authorised to make . . . secret conventions . . . Nevertheless the 
conditions agreed upon in the secret engagements receive their exe- 
cution as though they had been notified . . . Clause IX. As soon 
as circumstances permit the political operations which have given 
rise to secret conventions to be made public, the Committee will 
report to the Convention the object of the negotiation and the 
measures it has taken." Moniteur. Reprint, Vol. XXIII, page 719. 

-Moniteur. Reprint, Vol. XXIII, p. 692. 

*We find an echo of this uneasiness in an outburst from Merlin 
de Thionville at the sitting of the 24th of Ventose: — "For a long time 
past," he said, "absurd counter-revolutionary rumours concerning 
the N^endee have been spread about. . . ." Moniteur. Reprint, Vol. 
XXIII, p. 719. It is to be noted that the Moniteur does not mention 
the reception of Charette's flags: its echo must be sought for in less 
officially inspired sheets. The Vendee leaders, Blin and Bureau, 
were charged to hand the royal standards to the Committee of 
Public Safety; they accompanied them with a letter in which they 
once more protested that the people of Vendee "would be faithful 
to the engagements they had made and again expressed the grati- 
tude of Vendee to Citizen Ruelle, who had done everything to inspire 
confidence and make the revolution as well as the principles of the 
government loved." Courrier rSpublicain, 1st of Germinal, Vol. 
Ill, p. 165. 

227 



THE DAUPHIN 

tricolour emblems with which the bays of the praetorium 
were decorated as among the flags captured from enemies 
which formed a group behind the president's tribune. 

They dared to speak now of the little King and the 
Convention, silent on liis subject and unconcerned with 
his sad situation for so long, grew anxious to know what 
would become of him ; for it was necessary to choose be- 
tween these alternatives: to condemn this child of nine 
to perpetual imprisonment — and this would have been 
so extraordinary a thing in the history of the world that 
nobody regarded such a solution as admissible — or to 
throw open his prison doors, in which case he would either 
have to be allowed to live in freedom in France or would 
have to be handed to some foreign power, both of which 
eventualities presented inconveniences. One day,^ after 
the reading from the Tribune of a somewhat dull royalist 
pamphlet vaunting the re-establishment of the Monarchy 
and "the voluntary exile," handsomely rewarded, of all 
the regicidal legislators who considered it prudent to avoid 
the rancour of the new sovereign, Lequinio proposed the 
expulsion "of the last offspring of the impure race of the 
tyrant"; a logical and justified proposition which was 
referred to the Committees. The problem must have ap- 
peared difficult for them to solve, for nearly a month 
elapsed before they published the results of their media- 
tions. Not until the 3rd of Pluviose — January 22nd, 
1795 — did Cambaceres speak in their name. 

Before hearing his speech, we must explain that Cam- 
baceres was one of the "clients" of the banker Petitval, 
of the chateau de Vitry. He it was whom Petitval had 
charged, in consideration of the payment of a sum of 
95,000 livres, "to occupy himself with the son of Louis 
XVI and to prove the substitution judicially." ^ Two 
hypotheses present themselves then. Either Cambaceres 

^The 8th of Nivose, year III. Monitenr of the 10th. 
'Revue historique, loc. cit., p. 74. 

228 



OUTSIDE THE TEMPLE 

believed that the Dauphin was still in the Temple, and 
in that case he would inform the Assembly of the fate re- 
served for the unfortunate orphan. In a few weeks he 
would be ten years old. Was the Republic going to leave 
him without masters, without care, and without com- 
panions.'' Was it going to condemn this innocent being 
to pass, in isolation and inaction, his childhood, adoles- 
cence, youth, manhood, old age, until decrepitude and until 
death.'* Since they were occupying themselves with him, 
now was the time to consider this harassing question 
frankly. . . . Or, on the contrary, Cambaceres was fully 
convinced of the royal identity of the child who was at 
Vitry, and in that case he had only to declare to the Con- 
vention that, not wishing to hand over the son of the King 
of France to the enemies of the country and being unable, 
on the other hand, to retain him in perpetuity, the Com- 
mittees had taken the wise step to assure his well-being 
and education and with that object had chosen a sure and 
comfortable residence situated in the midst of the coun- 
try, but which, through prudence, they abstained from 
indicating more clearly. In speaking thus he would have 
been assured of the unanimous approbation of the 
Assembly. 

But Cambaceres took care not to be precise. His 
speech was vague, full of phrases and excuses. He first 
of all enumerated the dangers which the maintenance in 
the Tower of the Temple "of individuals of the Capet 
family" presented. The whole Convention believing, after 
this exordium, that it was rid of the nightmare, ap- 
plauded frantically, whereupon, continuing his discourse, 
the same Cambaceres proved that it was quite as perilous 
to banish "these same individuals, destined to become, in 
the hands of foreigners, the eternal subjects of vengeance, 
hatred and war.^ In conclusion, he spoke a long time 
before proclaiming, after many evasions, that "if Rome 
had retained the Tarquins it would not have had to cora- 

moniteur of the 5th Pluviose. Reprint, Vol. XXIII, pp. 279-280. 

229 



THE DAUPHIN 

bat them." It was understood that the little Capet would 
remain in the Temple, or rather nothing was understood, 
unless it was that they were face to face with an inex- 
tricable difficulty. The proof of this is that Brival, a 
former Jacobin, but not one of the most rabid — rose in 
anger against this impossible situation, shouting that it 
was a great pity that, among so many useless crimes, they 
had not committed one more to rid the Republic of "the 
encumbering whelp." Immediately the whole revolted 
Convention uttered a unanimous cry of horror. . . .^ 

What the Convention could not guess is to-day evident : 
Cambaceres knew that the Dauphin was no longer in the 
Temple. But he also knew that he was no longer at Vitry. 
Here and there, there were only substitutes. Louis Blanc 
considers that Cambaceres' report "was exactly what one 
would have expected from a man let into the secret of the 
evasion." It was so worded also that one can almost de- 
tect in it the formal confession of ignorance as to the 
place where the son of Louis XVI was to be found, whilst 
strange oratorical artifices prepared opinion for the sur- 
prise of an unexpected reappearance. The following 
phrase, for instance, seems premonitory: "Even when he 
has ceased to exist, he will be found everywhere, and this 
idle fancy will long serve to encourage the guilty hopes of 
Frenchmen who are traitors to their country." ^ 

If such were the situation at the end of that winter of 
1795, if the authentic Dauphin were to be found neither 
at PetitvaPs chateau nor at the Temple, those who, after 
having withdrawn, as they thought, a presumptive King 
from his prison, perceived that they were in possession 
of a 'figurant, of whom they dare not make use, must have 
lived in a state of strange perplexity, since the real holder 
of the part might at any moment appear from the un- 
known retreat where he was hidden. Their anxiety in- 

^"There was a lively burst of indignation," wrote the contributor 
to the Moniteur. As a call to order was being demanded, Brival 
replied, "I call myself to order!" 

'Moniteur of the 5th of Pluviose. 

230 



OUTSIDE THE TEMPLE 

creased on seeing the son of the King of France become 
the stake of European peace. Spain, at war with the Re- 
public since the spring of 1793, was, in fact, disposed to 
end hostilities. For some months past a semblance of ne- 
gotiations had been entered upon at the outposts and 
it was already known that the Court of Madrid would 
lay down the liberation of Louis XVII as a first condition. 
The Committee of Public Safety, desirous of entering into 
negotiations, had sent to the Pyrenean frontier the mem- 
ber of the Convention Goupilleau and Citizen Bourgoing, 
ex-charge-d'affaires of France to Spain, with a recom- 
mendation to be ready to receive the Spanish plenipoten- 
tiaries, but "not to consent to anything relating to the 
son of Louis XVI." ^ Bourgoing established himself at 
Figuieres under the fallacious pretext of "private busi- 
ness," and entered, in his private capacity, into corre- 
spondence with Chevalier Ocariz, ex-Spanish Minister at 
Paris. As early as his first letter Ocariz made it clear 
that the handing over of the Dauphin was the principal 
condition of an eventual understanding. "The tender so- 
licitude of the Court of Spain is at this moment concen- 
trated on the children of Louis XVI, the French Govern- 
ment could not show in a more sensible manner the con- 
sideration it may have for Spain than by confiding to his 
Catholic Majesty those innocent children, who serve no 
purpose in France. His Majesty would be greatly con- 
soled by that condescension and from that time would co- 
operate most willingly in a rapprochment with France." ^ 
The representatives of the people were extremely inexpe- 
rienced diplomatists. Goupilleau, indignant at the Spanish 
proposal ordered Bourgoing to break off negotiations im- 
mediately. In vain did Bourgoing recommend more pru- 
dence and moderation, pointing out that it would at least 

^Manuscript de Van III contenant les premieres transactions des 
puissances de I'Europe avec la Republique francaise by Baron Fain, 
former secretary to the Military Committee of the National Conven- 
tion. 

^Fain, loc. cit., p. 164. 

231 



THE DAUPHIN 

he better to refer the matter to the Committee of Public 
Safety ; he could obtain nothing from the obstinate Mem- 
ber of the Convention and was obliged, to his great vexa- 
tion, to inform Ocariz that "his private business being 
concluded, he was retiring to his home at Nevers and 
ending their correspondence." 

This blunder was deplored on the Committee. Merlin 
of Douai, who was directing the negociations, tried to 
repair it and, after bestowing great praise on Bourgoing, 
in whom he placed his entire confidence, he requested him 
to go to Bayonne, find a pretext for re-opening the inter- 
rupted correspondence, and express to the Spanish diplo- 
mat his personal regret that an untimely proposition had 
suspended negotiations, whilst letting it be seen that "this 
proposition, although not of a nature to he adopted, at 
least for the moment, must not however prevent the open- 
ing of conferences which alone could bring about peace 
between the two nations." ^ 

The whole of this correspondence, of which but a very 
summary outline is here given, shows distinctly that, in 
the spring of 1795, the Court of Spain offered to recog- 
nise the French Republic and treat without delay on the 
express condition that the children of Louis XVI were 
handed to it. On that point it would not give way. On 
its side, the Committee of Public Safety declared a great 
and sincere desire for peace but refused to hand over the 
child of the Temple, or at least would consent to do so 
only later . . . why? Was it not because they no longer 
had the Dauphin at their disposal? What other motive 
could justify those persistent evasions? It is certain 
that the Convention, the people of Paris, the whole of 
France, — save perhaps a few fanatics, those who were 
being maltreated and pursued since Thermidor, — would 
have hailed the deliverance of little Capet with delight, 
since it would have resulted in the Bourbons recognising 
the Republic. 

*Fain, loc. cit., p. 167. 

23g 



OUTSIDE THE TEMPLE 

From that time it seems as though an order had been 
given. They tried to spread the opinion that the little 
prisoner could not be shown; he had been subjected to 
such odious and cruel tortures "in the days of the in- 
famous Commune of Paris" that they could not think of 
producing him. Mathieu, in the Tribune of the Conven- 
tion, had already uttered words which resembled either a 
threat or a confession. They had been speaking of as- 
signats with the royal visage, the revived credit of which 
was causing anxiety, and in reference to this Mathieu 
said: "Despite all manoeuvres the National credit will 
be strengthened . . . and Capet's son, as well as the 
assignats bearing an effigy, will remain withdrawn." ^ 
What did he mean? Were his words a mere oratorical 
effect, — a very clumsy one in truth, — or was it the speak- 
er's intention to insinuate that the child in the Temple 
had now no more value than a spurious coin.f* That was a 
rumour which now circulated in Government circles. 
Baron Hue has related that the members of the Commit- 
tees declared openly : "If, on the occasion of some popular 
movement, Parisians were to go to the Temple we should 
show them a little boy whose stupid air and imbecility 
would oblige them to renounce the plan of placing him on. 
the throne." ^ And that was exactly the same rumour 
heard by Frotte, the leader of the Normandy insurrection. 
Conversing, on a certain day in March, 1795, with a mem- 
ber of the Convention, "one of the most influential" among 
those representatives charged to bring about peace in 
the west, — Frotte showed the desire, if peace were con- 
cluded, to be allowed to enter the Temple "to serve there 
the unfortunate remains of the blood which reigned over 
France." The member of the Convention looked at him 
for some time without uttering a word. At last, break- 
ing the silence he exclaimed: "We are not alone, we will 
see each other again to-morrow at my house if you like, 

''Moniteur of the 11th of Frimaire, year III. 
'Hue. Dernieres annees due regne de Louis XVI. 

233 



THE DAUPHIN 

and I will reply to jou frankly." Frotte kept the appoint- 
ment, as one may imagine, to the minute. The Republican 
appeared "somewhat agitated.'* Did he know the truth? 
Had his first intention been to reveal everiftlimg? He 
contented himself with dissuading the royalist chief from 
his project and spoke in the following terms : "I must tell 
you the truth, because I think I may count on your dis- 
cretion. Your sacrifice would be useless ; you would be 
a victim of it and unable in any case to b^ of use to the 
son of Louis XVI. Under Robespierre they so changed 
the physical and moral nature of that unfortunate child 
that one has become entirely brutalised and the other can- 
not permit him to live. Consequently, give up this idea in 
which, in your own interest, I should very much regret see- 
ing you persist, as things are, because you have no idea of 
the degeneration and brutishness of the little creature. 
On seeing him you would feel only sorrowful and disgusted 
and it would be sacrificing yourself uselessly, for you 
will certainly soon see him perish and, once in the Temple, 
you might never come out again." ^ 

Unless these were the arguments of a man who wished 
to give a hint, they appear of a nature to excite rather 
than cool Frotte's devotion, for the more miserable the 
child's lot the more useful would be the assistance of a 
friend eager to help him . . . but did the member of the 
Convention, in speaking thus, express himself with all the 
frankness he had promised his interlocutor.'' By whom, 
then, was he informed of the prisoner's condition.'' — Not 
by his colleagues of the Convention who had visited the 
Temple during the past few months : Reverchon, Mathieu, 
Harmand, Goupilleau and Andre Dumont, none of whom 
in fact had ascertained that the child was ill, otherwise 
they would undoubtedly have demanded medical care for 
him. This obstinacy in throwing the whole responsibility 
on to the abolished Commune and the guillotiner Robes- 

^Letter from Frotte to Lady Atkins. L. de la Sicotiere, Louis de 
Frotte et les insurrections normandes, I, pp. 92 and 93. 

234 



OUTSIDE THE TEMPLE 

pierre could only be justified if the Thermidorians who 
followed them showed themselves full of engaging atten- 
tions towards the poor little captive, if they authorised 
him to walk in the garden, permitted his sister to spend 
the day with him and finally did their best by every means 
to re-establish his compromised health and make prison 
supportable. No. They went "to verify" his presence, 
yet drew up no report, protested in private, — if they pro- 
tested at all ! — and contented themselves with spreading 
the rumour that the fault of this terrible crime rested on 
the shoulders of Robespierre, who had been dead for eight 
months. Either the prisoner was not ill and in that case 
the secret entrusted to Baron Hue and Frotte to dis- 
suade them from going to the Temple becomes extremely 
suspicious, or else the rumours afloat were not imaginary, 
the child was languishing away, he was in danger, — and in 
that case the Committee was guilty, humanly and politi- 
cally, in losing its interest in his condition; the Com- 
mittees showed themselves to be far more cruel than "the 
odious Commune," Laurent and Gomin surpassed Simon 
the scapegoat in barbarity, since in his time at least doc- 
tors were called to the prison at the sign of the slightest 
indisposition and little Capet as was oflficially estab- 
lished, was left by the shoemaker in perfect health. It is 
necessary, therefore, to return to the Temple to attempt 
to know what was happening there. 



Nothing was happening there. Laurent, it is true, had 
gone. After having borne the burden of superintendence 
for three months absolutely alone and assisted by Gomin 
for five more months, he considered his task accomplished. 
The jealous ones of his section had incessantly annoyed 
him, incessantly denounced him as not over trustworthy. 
Was it owing to these vexations that he wished to escape, 
or was it that he preferred to be at a distance on the day 

235 



THE DAUPHIN 

when negotiations with Spain led to a thorough enquiry 
and exposure of the events of the Temple to the light of 
day? Perhaps, also, he was desirous of profiting by the 
growing influence of Barras, who, indeed, was to place 
him in the police and later "particularly recommend" to 
the minister this young man "whom I have employed," 
he wrote, "in several very important missions, which he 
has carried out with zeal and intelligence." ^ Laurent 
left the Tower on March 31st, 1795, and was replaced, 
in attendance on Gomin, by Etienne Lasne, house-painter 
by trade and commander of the armed force of the Droits 
de I'Homme section. He was "a fairly worthy man," 
curt in his speech ; but if we abstain from borrowing from 
the gossip attributed to him in his old age we remain, as 
in the case of Gomin, devoid of information concerning 
this person. Madame Royale calls him "a very good man" 
and says no more about him. 

Can we find in the princess' narrative any indication as 
to what the little prisoner's life was at that time.? No. 
Because she was kept completely isolated from him. It 
was not until much later that she was informed of this 
when semi-liberty was given her ; even then she learnt 
nothing except through Lasne and Gomin, and we con- 
tinue to be astonished that during those months of April 
and May she did not ask and obtain from her two jailors 
the favour of seeing her brother. And who was it then 
imposed that inflexible regulation? Barras assures us 
that he gave contrary orders ; Harmand of the Meuse 
reiterated his instructions ; but never any notice was taken 
of them, and for more than a year, alone in the sad Tower, 
those two children lived but a few steps from each other 
without the charitable ingenuity of the jailors leading to 
at least the opportunity for a fortuitous meeting on the 

^Concerning Laurent, after his departure from the Temple, see 
F. Barbey's Christophe Laurent geolier de Louis XVII and Victor 
Tantet's article Louis XVII au Temple in the Revue Hebdomadaire 
for April 19th, 1905. 

236 



OUTSIDE THE TEMPLE 

staircase! ^. The joint management of Lasne and Gomin 
about the persons of Marie Therese and the boy called 
Monsieur Charles has left in the files of the archives stUl 
fewer traces than that of Laurent. The documents are 
absolutely silent. The child who was occupying the 
anxious attention of all the foreign cabinets was already 
cut off from the world without one knowing what author- 
ity assumed the responsibility of so atrocious and inex- 
plicable a subtraction. Certain journals announced that 
a kingdom had been formed for him in the centre of Eu- 
rope and that he was to be elected sovereign of Poland. 
His long martyrdom touched every heart. Paris thought 
of him," — Paris joyful and vibrating, sunny and flowery 
at the dawn of summer. But nothing of all this gaiety 
of life, of all these rays pierced the walls behind which 
they kept encaged, like a savage beast, that forlorn boy 
of ten. In the great city, pulsating day and night for 
centuries past, the place where he was formed an islet 
of death, so deep was the silence which enveloped it, so 
many barriers, walls, railings, sentinels and jailors were 
there to prevent the eyes of the living reaching him. 

However, like a mechanism wound up at a fixed hour, 
the service at the Temple worked methodically. The civil 
commissioner sent daily by one of the forty-eight sections 
arrived at noon and remained until the next day. Of the 
two hundred and ten men who thus assumed superintend- 
ance of the prison, from October 29th, 1794, until the 
end of May, 1795, not one has left a scrap of narrative, 
a line of a report, a word, an indication, an impression, 
however fugitive, of his twenty-four hours' sojourn at 

^The order given to the civic commissioners was "that there must 
not be any communication between the brother and sister prisoners 
. . . these prisoners must be kept in absolute ignorance that they 
are in the same place." Narrative of Belanger, civic commissioner 
on duty at the Temple on the 12th of Prairial. F. R. Laurenti6s, 
Louis XVII, supplement, p. 7. 

="They demand the opening of the Temple. . . ." Summary of 
Chenier's report. Courrier republicain of the 13th of Florial, 
year III. 

237 



THE DAUPHIN 

the Temple. Not one has said he saw the Dauphin. We 
know that they arrived at the same time as the soldiers 
going on guard and that they left the following day 
after their drudgery was over; nothing else. Not one 
of the officers of the National Guard who were there also 
daily, three in number, — Commander, Captain, and Adju- 
tant, — and who spent their day at the council room table 
if it rained, in the courtyards and gardens if it was fine, 
has set down in a diary, or in any private letter which 
has come down to us the recollections of that memorable 
sentry duty. Without the cook's accounts, we should be 
justified in believing that the prisoner was no longer 
there and that, as the gossips of the neighbourhood said, 
"they had removed him far away." The steward Lienard, 
— still more silent, more mysterious and more spectral 
than all his surroundings, — kept his accounts with 
minute precision and exactitude. We can almost tell from 
them what the prisoners ate at each meal. They were 
well fed, moreover. "On the 1st of Germinal (March 
21st), two fowls for the prisoners"; on the 8th, 11th, and 
19th, the same mention; on the 29th "two pounds of jam 
and a pound of chocolate for the prisoners"; on the 21st 
"a bundle of asparagus and fish," — the illiterate account- 
ant writing asperches for asperges and poisant for pois- 
son; and on the 28th "whitings and two brioches." Now, 
the 21st and 28th of Germinal of the year III correspond 
to Friday the 10th and 17th of April, 1795. There was, 
then, somewhere in the depths of the kitchens a worthy 
man anxious to establish the concordance of the calendars 
in order to serve on days of abstinence meatless menus 
to the poor child who so long had lost, in his solitude 
and darkness, the notion of the seasons and months.^ 

^National Archives, F', 4393. Document 325. In Lienard's ac- 
counts, in addition to the mention "a plump fowl for the prisoners," 
we meet fairly frequently with other menus entirely meatless, con- 
cording with Friday, as, for instance, on the 18th of Pluviose, year 
III, when "spinach, mushrooms and fish" were served. The more 
often fish was bought on Friday and at the same time meat was 
purchased, probably for the meals served in the council room. 

238 



OUTSIDE THE TEMPLE 

We note that a napkin, renewed every day, was supplied 
to each prisoner.^ The expenses for the maintenance 
of Madame Royale do not appear to have been reduced. 
The following items are set down : "for the girl Capet, 
5 ells of linen at 20 Imres per ell, 9 ells of ribbons at 6 
livres per ell, 16 busks, 10 sols each, 8 ells of laces at 5 
sols per ell and the making of 4* corsets at 18 litres 
each." " There were also "4 pairs of cotton stockings 
for the girl Capet at 16 livres per pair; thread, a needle, 
ribbon and a thimble, a pound of powder, pommade, a 
pound of Cologne, knitting thread, and QQ livres to Citi- 
zen Fretillot, watchmaker, for mending two gold watches 
belonging to the girl Capet. ^ The name of the boy pris- 
oner occurs more rarely. However, we see in Vendemiaire 
"4 pairs of cotton stockings for the boy Capet," and 
also in Germinal there re-appears the following item, 
omitted for a long time : a bushel of vetch for the pigeons 
of the boy Capet, 20 livres." Sometimes we come across 
"two pounds of tobacco," or "slippers," these being for 
Tison, who continued to bewail his fate and wait in vain 
for release from his dungeon. 

From the material point of view there was nothing pain- 
ful in this regime ; the appalling side of it was the idleness 
in which the solitary child remained. Members of the 
Committees, representatives at the Convention, guardians 
and jailors, all affected to show not the slightest interest 
in his education. We do not know how he occupied 
his long days, since not one of those who were able to 
come into contact with him has related anything worthy 
to be set down in history.^ In the days when he lived 

^National Archives, the same file. 

^The same file, document 128. 

^The same. Passim. 

■•It is difficult, indeed, to accept unreservedly narratives such as 
that of the architect Belanger, who, as civic commissioner, spent 
the day of the 12th or 13th of Prairail at the Temple, and who did 
not think of setting down his recollection until twenty years later, 
at a time when it had become profitable to show pity for the Dau- 
phin's lot and to declare death had been risked when showing defer- 
ence towards and interest in him. These narratives, written at the 

239 



THE DAUPHIN 

with his parents, the Dauphin knew how to write and al- 
ready wrote correctly; he was learning the history of 
France and arithmetic ... of the child who vegetated 
in the Temple since Simon's departure, nobody is able 
to show a line of writing, a signature, or even a scrawl. 
Was that because he did not know how to hold a pen? 
Did he never ask his jailors, — so full of attentions to 
him as they assure us later, — for a pencil and a sheet 
of white paper, which every child demands as soon as he 
has once used them? Was that also the reason why they 
did not provide masters for him? Since nothing shows 
and nobody states that he was ill, why did they not see 
to his instruction? Did the Convention, which had pro- 
claimed and decreed the right of the humblest to the bene- 
fits of work and study, wish to condemn to stupidity the 
only being whose guardianship it held collectively? It 
was quite determined, then, never to hand over that child 
to the Foreign Powers, since it required his intelligence 
to waste away in inaction? The honour of the Republic 
demanded, however, that, on the inevitable day when the 
son of the King of France was set free, his physical and 
intellectual condition should bear witness to the care he 
had received and the generosity of the people who, for 
reasons of state, had too long kept him captive. The 
more we come back to these questions, the stronger our 
conviction becomes that the child kept in the Temple was 
not the child of Louis XVI; the government, ignorant 
as to what had become of the royal child, was waiting until 
chance revealed him, or until his retreat was discovered 
in order to decide his fate and come to a decision re 
garding him in conformity with the country's interest. 

For Spain was insisting. At each new conference it 
gave way on all points save one: the handing over of the 
two children of the king. It was to Bale, at the house 
of Ochs, that, since the end of Florial, the negotiators had 

time of the Restoration, are open to suspicion because of the pathetic 
tone they affect and owing to the impossibility in most cases of 
controlling their truth, 

240 



OUTSIDE THE TEMPLE 

removed M. de d'Yriarte, the Spanish plenipotentiary 
and Citizen Barthelemy, the spokesman of the Republic, 
"passed in review all the clauses of two contradictory 
plans," neither of which appeared to them irreconcilable. 
The prisoner of the Temple was the shoal. Yriarte urged 
that the death of Louis XVI having been the signal for 
hostilities between the two nations, the deliverance of his 
son ought to be the pledge of their reconciliation. The 
Committee of Public Safety wished to avoid "giving an 
explanation" thereon ; but how could Barthelemy set aside 
as accessory the question which for his interlocutor was 
the principal one? Yriarte, moreover, would not listen 
to anything, declaring that "family interests and motives 
of honour obliged the Court of Madrid to demand the 
children of Louis XVI. Not only Spain but the Court 
of Sardinia could never consent to an arrangement with 
France before having obtained in that respect satisfac- 
tion, based on the strongest feelings of nature." The 
representative of the Republic saw himself then hard 
pressed. It is true that his instructions authorised him 
to promise, if absolutely necessary, the liberation of the 
young prince after a general peace, and that anxiety "to 
gain time" again indicates that the Committee had not 
lost all hope of discovering the place where the Dauphin 
was hidden. Besides, it advised Barthelemy "to speak as 
little as possible on the subject." But Yriarte would 
not speak of anything else. "The desire at Madrid to 
see the prisoners of the Temple free," he said, "weighs 
more than any other consideration in seeking for peace. 
On our side it is a duty, a religion, a creed, fanaticism 
if you like. If we had the choice between the children 
of Louis XVI and the offer of a few departments border- 
ing our frontier, we should choose the former. My in- 
structions refer to appanages and pensions ; but that 
is not the real question. We would receive the prisoners 
without condition if necessary. . . . Finally, it is not 
when settling the details of a general peace, but imme- 

241 



THE DAUPHIN 

diately after the exchange of the ratification of our pri- 
vate peace, that we should demand them from you." Bar- 
thelemy continued on the defensive, but his arguments 
were weak. The Committee of Public Safety whispered 
to him that "the Republicans, unanimous regarding all 
the rest, would diverge opinion on that special point." 
To this the Spaniard replied by citing the large number 
of members of the Convention who, either for one reason 
or another, had voted for the expulsion of the prisoners 
outside the territory of the Republic. "Besides," he con- 
cluded, "one could, in order to reassure France, insert 
in the treaty a public or secret clause by which Spain 
undertook not to allow the children of Louis XVI to 
leave its territory and never to permit them to become a 
centre disquieting to the French Government." 

Barthelemy was brought to a "yes" or a "no." The 
insistence of the Spanish plenipotentiary had lasted for 
nearly a month and the representative of the Republic 
was in a position of very great embarrassment when, on 
the 27th of Prairail, he received by a courier from the 
Committee of Public Safety a dispatch dated the 21st, 
bringing him the treaty recently signed with Prussia. A 
few lines, added as a postscript, ran as follows: "there 
was announced this morning to the National Convention 
the news of the death of Capet's son, which was heard with 
indifference, and of the capitulation of Luxembourg, which 
was received with the greatest enthusiasm." ^ 

Under the conditions then prevailing, this incident, "by 
which the policy of the Committee thought itself set at 
ease" ^ appeared to the whole world too opportune. — 
"Nobody expected this event ; generally people considered 
"this end hardly natural and over sudden" ^ and gave 
themselves up to "hideous conjectures." The Committee 
of Public Safety, delivered from pressing difficulties, and 

^Manuscrit de Van III by Baron Fain. 
^The same, loc. cit. 

^ Correspondence of Mallet du Pan with the Court of Vienna, 
Berne, June 27th, 1795. 

242 



OUTSIDE THE TEMPLE 

the only obstacle standing in the way of peace with Spain 
being juggled away, the treaty was signed a month later.^ 



It is, therefore, at the prison of the Temple we must 
follow the peripetias of that most appropriate denounce- 
ment, with the hope of finding evidence less unsatisfac- 
tory than that collected up to the present. We should 
be justified in believing, indeed, that, notwithstanding the 
indifference affected by the French Government, it under- 
stood the importance of the event, and that, if only 
through deference for the Foreign Powers with which it 
was treating, the surprising disappearance of the stake 
so fiercely disputed was to be cleared up and authenticated 
in a manner forever unassailable. An error ! Either 
through inexcusable negligence or through a determina- 
tion to make the mystery impenetrable, we find around 
the little corpse nothing but confusion, obscurity, un- 
certainty, affectation of false publicity, dissimulation, and 
manifest subterfuges. 

Harmand of the Meuse and his colleagues of the Com- 
mittee came to the Temple on December 19th, 1794. The 
account of their inspection is the last narrative we pos- 
sess coming from visitors who saw the prisoner living. 
He was at that time in good health, and we know from 
the menus set down in the accounts of the steward Lienard 
that, until the end of Germinal at the very least, the child's 
diet indicates a perfect state of health. Must we accept 
the very different testimony coming from an English trav- 
eller, devoid of all historic preoccupation, who, at the 
time of the Restoration, met by chance a Parisian trades- 
man who, in 1795, had been a civic commissioner? This 
member of one of the sections being on guard at the 
Temple obtained, he said, from Lasne and Gomin an 
authorisation to enter the prisoner's room but "on the 

'July 22nd, 1795, 

243 



THE DAUPHIN 

express condition not to speak to him.'* The child was in 
bed and remained an hour without moving. At last, con- 
jecturing the presence of a stranger, he asked, in a weak 
voice, who it was. Receiving no reply, he raised himself 
up, put his legs out of bed, and sitting on the edge of the 
mattress, remained there "in an astonishing position." 
The commissioner was very astonished at the prisoner's 
stature and "at what it would be if he were standing up." 
The face of the unfortunate boy was covered with ulcers 
and pimples, and it also appeared that he had scabs, 
resulting from itch, behind his head. He then got back 
into bed, still keeping a grim silence, covered himself up 
to the nose with his eyes fixed on the visitor, save when 
he closed them from time to time for several minutes. 
Two or three times he moved his lips as though he wished 
to speak, but his articulation was but a breath and 
nothing could be distinguished. "He was the most piti- 
able human being I have ever seen," added the narrator.^ 
If such were the prisoner's state, it is not astonishing 
that, in the early days of May, Lasne and Gomin de- 
cided to inform the Committee of General Safety, "The 
child Capet," according to their reports, "felt an indis- 
position and infirmities which appeared to assume a seri- 
ous character." The Committee decreed that "the first 
officer of health of the Hospice de L'Humanite should 
call upon the patient and administer the necessary reme- 
dies to him"; but ordered that the doctor could not see 
him ^'except in the presence of the jailors." ^ The Com- 
mittee did things well, for he who, in revolutionary jargon 
was designated under the title of officer of health was no 
other than the head physician of the Hotel Dieu, De 
Pierre Joseph Desault, who was considered at that time 
to be the leading practitioner of Paris. He went the 
same day, or the day after, to the Temple. His visits 

^National Archives, F\ 4392. Document 101. The 17th of Flor6al 
(May 6th, 1795). 

'Ireland's France, London, 1822, quoted in The Lost Prince, by 
J, H. Hanson, New York, 1854. 

M4i 



OUTSroE THE TEMPLE 

and the little patient's attitude in his presence served 
for the writing of long and touching narratives unsup- 
ported in their development by any authentic document. 
All we know is that Desault returned to the prison several 
times, and simply ordered infusions of hops and massage 
of the joints with alkali.^ As to pimples, ulcers, and the 
itch, there is not an allusion. Did the child speak to 
the Doctor? How did he diagnose the case? We do not 
know, Desault*s report to the Committee of General Safety 
— if there was a report, which is probable — never having 
been discovered. 

Desault paid his last visit to the Temple on May 29th.^ 
Not that the patient was cured; it was the doctor who 
was about to die. He succumbed on June 1st and the 
child remained for a whole week without any other care 
than that of his jailors, from which we may conclude 
that Desault's diagnosis had not been alarming. Lasne 
and Gomin must have been reassured by him, otherwise 
(unless they carried out their work with a carelessness 
and obduracy in disaccord with the sensibility they showed 
later) they would not for six full days have assumed the 
responsibility of treating the dying child without a doc- 
tor's advice. Not until June 3rd did the Commission of 
Public Aid replace Desault at the Temple by Pelletan, 
"known for his talent, and lecturer on anatomy at the 
school of health" ; ^ and from the time of his appoint- 

^A. de Saint-Gervais. Preuves autUentiques. 

'"The Commission of Public Aid to the Committee of General 
Safety: — 'Since the tenth of this month (10th of Prairial — May 
29th) Citizen Desault, owing to serious indisposition, has not been 
able to attend Capet fils.' " Quoted by Dr, Cabanes in Les Morta 
Mysterieus de I'Histoire, p. 437, note. 

'Quoted by Dr. Cabanfes in' Les Morts Mysterieux de I'Histoire. 
Apart from that work Pelletan has declared that, before his oflScial 
appointment, he had attended the prisoner in the Temple, calling upon 
him daily in the Tower from the day when Desault ceased to appear 
there. See Revue rMrospective. Nouvelle serie. Quoted by A. 
Bfegis, p. 8. So that it would appear there was no interruption in 
the treatment of the patient, which seems hardly likely, for we 
possess the decree of the Committee of General Safety accrediting 
Pelletan as doctor to the Temple, a decree which was to serve as a 

245 



THE DAUPHIN 

ment the air of mystery which for so many months had 
enveloped the Temple was somewhat dissipated. 

Pelletan, according to Mallet du Pan, was "a fero- 
cious revolutionary who acted as a spy for the Committee 
of General Safety in the Saint-Lazare prison, when the 
lists of victims to be guillotined were being drawn up 
there.-^ This incrimination appears as vague as it is 
difficult to admit. Moreover, the more or less advanced 
opinions of a doctor matter little; it is his professional 
capacity alone which must be taken into consideration. 
Now, Pelletan had then a great reputation; his science 
and experience imposed him as a worthy successor to 
Desault, and we must, therefore, believe that the little 
patient was in good hands. Unfortunately the account 
which Pelletan left of his first visit to the Temple was 
written at the time of the Restoration (in 1817), an imi- 
ation of a chivalrous and tearful fashion, which denotes 
a transposition. However, we find precious details among 
the imaginary ones. The doctor, on entering the former 
apartment of Louis XVI, which the child now inhabited, 
and which appeared to him to be "clean and convenient," 
found the patient surrounded by toys such as "a small 
printing plant, a little billiard table, books, etc." Lasne 
and Gomin, as well as the civic commissioner on duty 
that day, "lavished almost paternal care on him." Pel- 
letan having pointed out that "the noise of the bolts 
and locks appeared to distress the child every time the 
door of his apartment was opened," requested that the 
grating of these useless pieces of metal should be dead- 
ened; and, as the jailors hastened to agree to this, he 
suggested that, if the prisoner could be carried, at least 
during the day, "to the doorkeeper's (sic) salon looking 
on to the garden," he would receive greater alleviation 
there. Up to this point his evidence may be accepted indis- 

pass to the physician when entering the Tower. Now, this document 
is dated the 17th of Prairial (June 5th) National Archives, BB 30, 
964. 

^Correspondence avec la cour de Vienne, Berne, June 21st, 1795. 

m6 



OUTSIDE THE TEMPLE 

putably. Pelletan becomes slightly open to suspicion 
when he adds: "Unfortunately all assistance was too 
late ... no hope was to be entertained." This is evi- 
dently the retrospective opinion of a doctor who, to ex- 
plain an unsuccessful case, protests "that he has not 
been called in early enough." No, Pelletan did not con- 
sider the case a desperate one when he paid his first visit 
on June 6th. . . . His prescription proves that, since 
it consists of a dietary to be followed for a long time, 
and one which is not particularly rigid in any way. "The 
patient must breakfast at 10 o'clock on chocolate or 
bread and currant jam. At dinner he must eat meat, 
soup and sometimes vegetable soup, a little boiled, roast 
or grilled meat, vegetables such as asparagus, spinach, 
etc. In the afternoon for his gouter, apple, currant, apri- 
cot or grape jam, etc. For his supper, he may eat a 
little roast or grilled meat but especially vegetables; 
finally, he may be given a little salad made with lettuce, 
endive, chervil, cress or watercress. He may drink a 
little wine at his meals. He must be put to bed at nine 
o'clock and rise at six a. m.'* There is a single thera- 
peutic order: Pelletan recommends the decoction of hops 
already ordered by Desault, and of this the child was 
to drink, every morning, three cupfuls, "to which must 
be added a tablespoonful of anti-scorbutic syrup." ^ 
Four meals a day with meat, salad, wine, meat soup 
and sometimes vegetable soups, which clearly shows that 
this strengthening diet was to be continued for an indefinite 
time. These prescriptions, written and signed by Pelle- 
tan immediately after examining the child manifestly 
weaken his narrative of 1817, in which he asserts that, at 
the first glance, he came to the conclusion that the little 
prisoner, "whose stomach was very enlarged" and whom 

'^National Archives, BB 30, 964. It was the lamented Dr. Max 
Billard who first published the text of these precious documents, 
in Intermediarre des Chercheurs et curieux, Vol. LXIII, No. 1283, 
col. 211 and following. 

Ml 



THE DAUPHIN 

he recognised to be "suffering" from "chronic diarrhea," 
had but a few days to Hve. 

The poor recluse, then, left his prison and was led "to 
the doorkeeper's salon." By this Pellatan doubtless means 
Gomin's room, that "little downstairs salon'" of which 
Madame Royale speaks and which was no other than the 
room in the little tower formerly inhabited by the Queen. 
This room was, in fact, the only one which had a direct 
view on to the garden. To get there it was necessary 
to descend the long stone staircase, pass before the door 
of the guard room on the first floor, — a room always full 
of soldiers, continue to descend until almost on a level 
with the Council Room, and then enter the branch of the 
staircase leading to the ground floor of the Little Tower. 
On arriving there, they had still to ascend a wooden in- 
terior staircase before reaching the salon in question, 
a light, bright and fairly large room from which the fine 
furniture in blue and white silk damask, belonging to 
M. Barthelemy, had certainly not been removed. Per- 
haps the couch with little pink flowers which had been 
put up there for the Dauphin on August 14th, 1792, was 
still there. Pelletan had asked that the little patient should 
be allowed to pass the days there. Did they leave him 
there at night? Tradition says so; but only tradition, 
based on a series of narratives whose elegiac poesy is bet- 
ter than their documentation. It appears inadmissible 
that the commissioner and the officers on duty should 
have dared to break their regulations to the point of al- 
lowing the prisoner to pass the night in a room the bal- 
cony of which was within easy reach of the garden, and 
at a great distance, moreover, from the council room, the 
headquarters of their surveillance. It was, it is believed, 
usual for the child to remain alone from night until morn- 
ing; his door was bolted at night, and even during his 
last days his jailors paid no further attention to him until 
the next day. He spent the day of June 6th (18th of 
Prairial) in the blue and white salon of the Little Tower ; 

MS 



OUTSIDE THE TEMPLE 

that appears to be undoubted, since Pelletan writes: 
"The success of this removal was such that the child dis- 
played gaiety and gave himself up more freely to the 
interest they took in him." But this text does not imply 
that he was permanently installed in the pretty room. 

It must be pointed out that a radical change had been 
made in the regime of the Temple since the six days of 
deep silence which elapsed between Desault's last visit and 
Pelletan's first consultation, that they no longer feared 
to show the little captive, that he was no longer a pris- 
oner, that the guard tolerated his removal from one 
tower to another, that attendants and soldiers were at 
last able to see him at their leisure, either when he de- 
scended the staircase or when he took the air on his bal- 
cony, which had neither a sunblind nor any other obstruc- 
tion. And what is still more surprising, the child's very 
nature appeared to be suddenly modified. He was agi- 
tated by the sinister noise of bolts, he who, however, must 
have been accustomed to it from the many, many months 
he had heard it ; he was pla3ang with a printing plant and 
had books ; therefore he had not forgotten his alphabet and 
once again took pleasure in reading. He no longer con- 
demned himself to silence ; and it was to this time — and to 
this time only — that Lasne and Gomin alluded later when 
they said that he often spoke to them, but only "during 
the last days of his life," on which point they are in agree- 
ment with Pelletan, since, according to him, the patient 
"showed gaiety," not merely by actions but certainly 
in words. A very strange thing this and a point worth 
noting, so as not to obstruct the path of future searchers 
- — some will always be found ! — anxious to elucidate this 
supreme enigma of the Royal captivity. 



The principal inconvenience presented by the fixed reso- 
lution to employ nothing but authentic documents de- 
prives the history of the prisoner of the Temple of the 



THE DAUPHIN 

melancholy and sorrowful attraction which has made it 
so popular. No feeling of pity is awakened by contact 
with the rare and laconic documents in the Archives when 
these are taken as our only guide ; no touching words fall 
from the pale lips of the dying boy ; there is no oppor- 
tunity for an affecting expansion of the subject of the 
heart-rending contrast between the abolished pomp of 
Versailles and the Trianon of former days and the bed 
of sickness on which the descendant of so many kings, 
absorbed in his dream, lay dying. Nothing more than a 
few administrative notes, as indifferent and dry as the 
spirit of offices, and from the arid text of which one at- 
tempts in vain to drain the wherewithal to furnish a tear. 
The Revolution demanded that this King should leave no 
traces in the annals of French history and that his end 
should be unwept. Consequently, we are reduced, if 
comments are prohibited, to a cold daily account in 
which gaps, lending themselves but little to compassion, 
abound. 

On June 7th Pelletan paid a second visit and left a fresh 
prescription. He made no change in the diet indicated 
the day before, but he recommended that they obtain for 
the patient "white bread made from pure wheat" and 
that the broth "be made with beef and chicken." -^ Mani- 
festly the child^s life was not threatened. It was only 
in the course of the evening of the same day that Gomin 
and Lasne became alarmed and sent for Pelletan at dead 
of night. What had happened.'' We do not know, but 
the doctor did not believe there was any danger, for 
he abstained from troubling himself, repl3dng: "the pa- 
tient's condition cannot be made very alarming by the 

^"Care must be taken," he wrote, "that it is not acrid through too 
short boiling." Pelletan prescribed, in addition, powdered rhubarb, 
6 grains, and extract of quinine, 4 grains, mixed, to be taken in a 
tablespoonful of liquid. Plus a chopine of the white codex mixture, 
that is to say: Hartshorn 10 gr., bread crumb 20., powdered gum 
arable 10 gr. ; white sugar 60 gr. and orange flower water 10 gr. 
with ordinary water q.s. And as a drink very weak broth." National 
Archives, BB 30, 964. 

250 



OUTSIDE THE TEMPLE 

circumstances you have detailed to me. . . . Although 
I am extremely tired with my day's work and it is eleven 
o'clock at night, I would leave immediately for the child's 
bedside if I knew I could be of the slightest use to him. 
. . ." ^ He announced in the same note that the surgeon 
Dumangin, doctor at the Charite Hospital, would hence- 
forth second him in his visits to the Temple, and he prom- 
ised to come with this confrere the next morning. The 
next day was June 8th (the 20th of Prairial). The two 
doctors arrived at 11 A. M.^ The patient's state was 
worse. They ordered a continuation of the white decoc- 
tion, alternating it with buttermilk. The patient was to 
take "broth every quarter of an hour" and have medicinal 
enemas, one immediately, the second in the evening, and 
still another "the next day before the doctors arrived." ^ 
Dumangin signed first, Pelletan after his confrere. Con- 
sidering it indispensable that a nurse should be at the bed- 
side of the dying boy, who was in the inexperienced hands 
of two commanders of the National Guard, Pelletan wrote 
a note which was to be taken post haste to the Committee 
of General Safety.^ "We found Capet's son," he de- 

'Pelletan added: "Night time not being favourable for the appli- 
cation of any kind of remedy, I think you must confine yourself to 
giving the patient half a grain of diascordium diluted in a table- 
spoonful of wine." National Archives, the same file. 

^Temple Register: extracts from the reports of the 20th and 21st 
Prairial, year III. National Archives, BB 30, 964. This very pre- 
cious document, which we shall henceforth follow, has been repro- 
duced in fac-simile in Francois Laurentie's fine work, Louis XVII, 
in fo. published by Emile Paul. 

'National Archives, BB 30, 964. 

^Notwithstanding all our efforts here to establish an exact chrono- 
logical account of the last moments of the prisoner of the Temple, 
it must be pointed out that this work is made singularly arduous, 
if not impossible, by the innumerable contradictions raised by each 
of the incidents of that day. Nothing would appear to be simpler 
than to enumerate one after the other and in their order the elements 
of information at one's disposal. Pelletan'S prescriptions and 
those signed by him and Dumangin are clear and precise documents 
which apparently are not open to discussion. Not so. Everything 
lends itself to discussion in the Louis XVII question, and these 
prescriptions have been declared by Pelletan and Dumangin them- 
selves to be forgeries. When, in 1816, Antoine de Saint-Gervais 
published his Vie du jeune Louis XVII, he questioned Pelletan and 

251 



THE DAUPHIN 

clared, "with a weak pulse, and an abdomen distended 

and painful. During the night and again in the morning 

he had had several green and bilious evacuations. His 

received information from him which he thought absolutely reliable. 
Thus, he learnt that the surgeon "blamed the jailors for not having 
removed the bars from the windows and for having left the enormous 
bolts intact . . ." etc. Pelletan also related that, when expressing 
himself with warmth on the subject of these bolts and bars, he saw 
the young prince sign to him to speak in a lower tone. "I am 
afraid," said the child, "that my sister will hear you and I should 
be very sorry if she learnt I was ill, because that would pain her." 
Saint-Gervais likewise heard from Pelletan that, "after an extraordi- 
nary weakness which presaged his approaching end, the patient, 
momentarily coming to himself, made a last effort to put his arm 
out of bed and offer it to the Doctor, who brought his lips to the 
prince's hand, moistening it with his tears." On reading this, 
Dumangin, who was living in retirement at that time at Saint- 
Prix, sent his confrere a somewhat harsh letter in which he claimed 
the honour of having been chosen, at the same time as Pelletan, to 
attend the son of Louis XVI. "Your narrative. Monsieur," he said, 
"has sensibly afflicted me on your account, for you appear alone, 
whereas common duties constantly called us together to the Temple. 
. . . Why, sir, have you forgotten to mention me? . . . Our bulle- 
tins, signed by us both, must be in the Archives. ... I confess that, 
if I had been present at the time of the wording which is before 
me, you would have had great difficulty in detailing your reproaches 
to the jailors, in making your speeches, and in bestowing the kiss 
which I did not see you place on the hand of the dying king. . . ." 
Pelletan's reply ran as follows: "By a letter of the 17th of Prairi'al 
(June 5th) the Committee of General Safety entrusted me with the 
continuation of the care that Capet's son received from Desault. 
. . . This letter does not mention you. I found the child in so 
grievous a condition that I immediately asked that another person 
of our art should be appointed to assist me . . . you called at my 
house on the 19th (June Tth), having been appointed by the Com- 
mittee and we went together to visit the august child. . . . We 
agreed that I should visit him the next day at my usual hour, 
seven or eight o'clock, and that you should call upon him about 
eleven o'clock. You cannot, therefore, either attest or deny conduct 
which you did not witness, any more than you can say what dictated 
my native sensibility and the simple proof of which I gave the 
august child, just as I would have given it to any other in the 
touching position he was. . . ." Preuves authentique de la mort de 
le jeune Louis XVII by A. de Saint-Gervais, p. 51 and following 
pages. In 1816 it was so much to the people's interest to have shown 
tenderness in 1795, regarding the lot of the descendant of the 
Bourbons, that they wrangled with each other over the question as 
to who had shown the greatest attachment and most marks of respect. 
So that we shall never understand, among a thousand other things, 
how it is that the prescription of the 20th of Prairial (June 8th) 
is signed by Pelletan and Dumangin, since Pelletan asserts that he 
went to the Temple on that day without his confrere, nor why the 
other prescriptions are signed by Pelletan alone, since Dumangin 
afOirms that all the visits were made co jointly with his colleague. 

252 



OUTSIDE THE TEMPLE 

condition appearing to us to be very serious, we have 
decided to see the child again this evening. ... It is in- 
dispensable to have an intelligent female nurse by his 
side.'* ^ . . . An estafette bearing this bulletin to the Com- 
mittee left immediately. At half past twelve P. M. the 
doctors left the Temple.^ The Civic Commissioner of the 
day has just arrived, — namely. Citizen Damont, of the 
Faubourg du Nord Section.^ Introduced into the Tower 
he entered the room where the prisoner was in bed and 
considered him to be so ill that he asked Gomin and Lasne 
"if there were not a nurse and officers of health." Lasne 
and Gomin, manifestly not over anxious to divulge what 
was happening at the Temple, replied "that a doctor 
had come recently, but women, no." They still hesitated, 
it seems, to introduce into the prison a stranger whom 
they feared might be indiscreet. However, on Damont 
insisting, Gomin was persuaded to leave for the Tuileries 
to inform the Committee of General Safety ^ of the situ- 
ation. Gomin set off a little after the mounted courier 
sent to the Committee had returned, bringing back an 
authorisation "to place by the bedside of Capet^s son an 
intelligent and honest woman, whom the doctors would 

^Temple Register, diary of the 20th of Prairial, 11 A. M. 

'Temple Register, diary of the 21st of Prairial. 

^Damont, who, in 1816, wrote a short account of his sentry duty, 
tells us of the manner in which the Commissioners who mounted 
guard for twenty-four hours at the Temple were appointed. The 
section whose turn to mount guard was approaching received notice 
a few days in advance from the Commission of Administrative 
Police. The Civic Committee of the section chose one of its members, 
whose name, Christian name, and address was sent to the Commis- 
sioner, which then drew up the Commissioner's authority and sent 
it to him. Furnished with this document, he called at the prison 
on the day fixed upon. Thus, Damont knew on the 13th of Prairial 
that he would be on duty on the 20th, and he also knew that on the 
21st he would be relieved by a Commissioner of the Reunion section. 
The choice of commissioners was not, then, kept secret and was not 
made suddenly, at the last moment, as was thought. 

*The Temple Register, in which the events of the day are set down 
hour by hour, does not mention this absence of Gomin, and it must 
be pointed out that it is absolutely impossible to make this diary, 
the only document we can consider as "official," agree with the 
narratives of Damont or of Pelletan, or with the depositions made 
later by Lasne and Gomin in a court of justice. 

253 



THE DAUPHIN 

choose." It was necessary, then, to await their promised 
visit. Lasne and Damont remained by the child's side, 
doing their best to follow the prescription and "admin- 
ister" to him the prescribed remedies ; but, about two 
o'clock, after having taken a tablespoonful of the potion 
the poor little fellow was shaken by a sort of death 
rattle, and a cold sweat moistening his forehead it looked 
as though he were going to die. Seized with fear, Lasne 
and the Commissioner despatched another horseman to 
Pelletan with the following pressing message: "Citizen, 
the patient has just been seized with a most violent at- 
tack and it is of the utmost necessity that you should 
come to his side immediately.". . . However, the alarm 
came to an end. Damont left the room, either because the 
dinner hour took him to the Council chamber, or because 
he went away to bring the prison register and diary up 
to date. This latter duty was not a sinecure, for not only 
were the smallest incidents to be set down, but the whole 
of the correspondence exchanged with the Committee, 
letters sent and received, and the doctors' bulletins were 
to be copied therein. . . . Either, then, because Damont 
was busy with this work or because he had sat down at 
table at the ordinary hour, so as not to alarm the prison 
staff, Lasne was alone in the patient's room. After about 
an hour's rest, the sick boy was seized with suffocation 
and made a sign to his jailor that "a call of nature re- 
quired satisfying." Lasne raised him up in bed; the dy- 
ing boy put his arms round the man's neck; he gave a 
great sigh and "passed away. . . ." The hour was a few 
minutes short of three.^ 

According to Damont, Gomin, returning from the Com- 
mittee of General Safety, arrived at the Temple at that 
very moment and entered the room just as the child gave 
up his last breath.^ He who might have heard the words 

^Temple Register, diary of the 20th and 21st of Prairial and 
Lasne's deposition before the examining magistrate Zangiacomi in 
1840. 

^Damont's narrative, Laurentie's Louis XVII, 

254 



OUTSIDE THE TEMPLE 

exchanged at that moment between the two jailors of the 
Temple might perhaps have known the solution of the 
historical enigma which this almost sudden death was all 
at once about to elucidate, unless it was to render it for 
ever insoluble. Neither Gomin nor Lasne had foreseen 
the prisoner's end, for he had been ill for only "the past 
two days." ^ and in bed but a few hours. How is it that 
the idea occurred to these two subordinates, — who up to 
then had shown no spirit of initiative and in everything 
asked only to order, — how is it that the idea occurred 
to them to keep the death of this child secret, as though 
it set a problem, the solution of which exceeded their 
competence .? Had they received preventive instructions 
or else, during their surveillance, — Gomin for seven 
months and Lasne for six weeks past, — had they con- 
ceived suspicions the coming to maturity of which filled 
them with terror. ^^ If we do not accept one or other of 
these suppositions their conduct was inexplicable. 

Their first precaution was to shut up in one of the 
rooms of the Tower the turnkey Gourlet, who in the 
course of his duty had chanced to come into the little 
Capet's apartment at the moment of death and who for 
that reason only was to remain imprisoned without com- 
munication of any sort with the other employes of the 
house.^ This precaution having been taken in concert 
with Damont, who was making his first visit to the Temple 
and whose manifest inexperience and naivete, far from em- 
barrassing the two jailors, on the contrary aided them, 
through the semblance of authority the Commissioner 
represented, Lasne and Gomin wrote to the Committee of 
General Safety a letter which Gomin was to carry him- 
self and in which they announced the event and asked 
for orders.^ During his colleague's absence, Lasne set 

^Lasne's deposition of July 13th, 1837. 

^Temple Register, loc. cit. 

'Letter written to the President of the Committee of General 
Safety. "At two o'clock in the afternoon, an attack having seized 
the patient after he had taken a spoonful of the potion ordered, 

855 



THE DAUPHIN 

to work to play the strangest and most gruesome of come- 
dies. He shut himself in with the corpse and showed him- 
self only from time to time when sending to the chemist for 
medicines, as though the child were still living. He even, 
every quarter of an hour, in accordance with doctors' 
orders, ordered from the kitchen the broth intended for 
the "patient," himself taking the cup at the outer door 
of the apartment, in order that no waiter might enter 
the death-chamber. If we picture to ourselves the compli- 
cation of this strange scheme, if we reckon the number 
of lies it necessitated, — for he must necessarily have af- 
fected calm, have distributed reassuring words to all that 
staff who took an interest in "Monsieur Charles" and 
asked for news of him, have announced that "he was doing 
better" and "would pull through," have made a pre- 
text that he was sleeping in order to prevent the officers 
of the guard from showing a desire to see him, and have 
feigned confidence in an early recovery, — if, above all, 
we appraise the uselessness of so unusual a stratagem, 
nay, its dangers in case it were discovered, we come to the 
conclusion that Lasne, a man of quite military plainness 
and frankness, must, in thus betraying his own character, 
have yielded to the impulse of some redoubtable and press- 
ing motive.^ 

Pelletan, summoned by estafette before the death, ar- 
rived at half past four. Lasne received him at the door 
of the room and ushered him into the dead boy's presence. 
Then, the normal time for a consultation having elapsed, 

we wrote to Dr. Pelletan asking him to come immediately to the 
patient's bedside. The horseman had just left when a second 
attack seized him and he passed away. As the turnkey has knowledge 
of the event we have imprisoned him in the Tower awaiting your 
orders." 

^The exact text of the Register is as follows: "We decided that, 
in order to remove all suspicion" — suspicion of what?— "the service 
should be continued for the child as before the event, that they 
should fetch from the apothecary's the medicines ordered and the 
broth from the kitchen, and that we should take care to carry these 
ourselves, so that the employes would have no access to the deceased's 
apartment." 

256 



OUTSIDE THE TEMPLE 

Lasne found himself obliged to inform the doctor that 
he could not let him go, but must keep him prisoner, con- 
fined in the Tower, like the turnkey Gourlet, until the 
Committee had decided what measures Vv^ere to be taken. 
Did Pelletan, whose time was precious, protest, demand 
his immediate liberation, or at least inquire the reasons 
for this extraordinary internment? Not at all. It is true 
that, the same morning, he had received directly from 
Houdayer,^ one of the secretaries of General Safety, the 
advice to be absolutely silent regarding what he might 
see or hear during his visits to the Temple. An astonish- 
ing recommendation from a bureaucrat of inferior rank 
to the chief medical officer of the leading Parisian hospi- 
tal.^ Pelletan, already warned — this is the word the 
secretary of the Committee uses — was not, then, aston- 
ished at being, in his turn, kept in custody in that tragic 
Tower where so many surprises were reserved for those 
who crossed its threshold. However, he had patients 
who were waiting for him, duties which claimed his at- 
tention, and we see him beginning a letter, which a horse- 
man was to take to the Committee and in which the doctor 
solicited, but very timidly, his liberation.^ 

Whilst Pelletan was writing his petition, Gorain was 

*In 1794 we find in the lists of the employes of the Committee: 
"Office of Arrears, chief secretary Houdayer." National Archives, 
F', 4,406B. 

"Committee of General Safety . . . Section of the Paris police, 
"On the 20th of Prairial . . . Houdayer told Citizen Pelletan confi- 
dently that it seemed to him that the Committee would be pleased 
if no rumour or gossip concerning the illness in question reached 
the public. It was a warning to maintain the greatest secrecy, a 
case of neglecting nothing in order to avoid even the slightest 
imprudence. National Archives, BB 30, 964. Published by I'lnter- 
mediare des chercheurs et curieux. Vol. LXIX, col. 53. Communi- 
cation of Mme. de Saint-Leger. 

'He set forth that, "summoned in haste to the Temple, he was 
detained there b)'^ the jailors of the boy Capet. . . . The undersigned 
submitted to this measure without difficulty but he begged the 
citizen president of the Committee to consider that, ... at the moment 
of writing, orders had arrived which made it useless to say any 
more. Pelletan." This letter was published by Dr. Bienvenu. Un 
'prohUme m6dico-Ugal : Louis XVII est-il mort dans la prison du 
Temple? Revue internationale illustree. 

257 



THE DAUPHIN 

returning from the Tuileries. He had been to the Com- 
mittee and the members to whom he had announced the 
death of Charles Capet had decided — under the true 
or false pretext that the Convention had just concluded 
its sitting — to postpone the publication of the decease 
until next day. Gomin, who was accompanied by Citizen 
Bourguiguon, Secretary of the Committee of General 
Safety, brought back a decree requesting the jailors of 
the Temple to inform Pelletan and Dumangin "that they 
must call in two of their most well informed confreres 
to proceed to open the body and ascertain its condition."^ 
Pelletan was, therefore, free and left the Temple, but 
not before assuring Gomin and Lasne of his "most com-; 
plete discretion."^ And, assisted by Damont, who, it ap- 
pears, was delighted to be mixed up in an event of this 
importance and who, as appeared later, understood noth- 
ing of the intrigue going on around him, the two jailors 
continued to deceive the prison staff, carrying up to the 
dead child's room the medicines just delivered by the 
chemist, and the meals supplied from the Tower kitchen. 
Dr. Dumangin, who still knew nothing, arrived at eight 
P. M. and was received by Lasne and Gomin, who informed 
him in great secret of the death, transmitted to him the 
Committee's decision concerning the autopsy and i^- 
quested him to arrange with Pelletan as soon as possible. 
They dismissed him, after recommending him to keep 
absolute silence.^ 

Lasne, Gomin and Damont were at last able to take 
breath. They were the only ones in the Tower who knew 
that the prisoner was no more ; the turnkej^ Gourlet who 
shared their secret was locked up, unable to communicate 
with anybod3\ To keep up the deception, it was neces- 
sary for the jailors and the Commissioner to take supper 
as usual with the officers of the guard, who did not suspect 

^Temple Register. 
The same. 
*The same. 

258 



OUTSIDE THE TEMPLE 

anything, an evident proof that the comedy was well 
played. The little dead boy, locked in his dark room 
in that upper floor, lay on his bed abandoned, without the 
flame of a candle flickering by his side, without a flower 
to caress his livid cheek, without a single one of those who 
had served him daring to shed a tear for him. We feel 
a sort of restraint in presenting this cold picture, so dif- 
ferent from those which legend has composed. There was 
no concert of the angels, nor the voice of the Queen calling 
to her child from heaven, nor did the birds of the Tower 
fly away never to return ; Gomin was not stifled with sobs, 
nor did Lasne retain throughout life the obsession of that 
last breath which had lightly touched his forehead; nor 
again was there a pious procession of employes of the 
Temple, coming to contemplate for the last time the 
features of the little captive whose soul was at last de- 
livered. . . , 

If the members of the Committee and the jailors of the 
Temple knew or suspected that he who had just died 
was not the child of the King of France this indifference 
and dissimulation were justified. In the contrary case, 
how is it that none of these men thought of the young 
girl who was afflicted by a fresh grief, after so many 
others.'' Neither Lasne nor Gomin, so "good to her," had 
the thought, when all was silent in the slumbering Tower, 
to lead her to her brother's bedside, in order, at least, that 
the body of the little King should not leave without a 
prayer for the common grave which awaited him. How 
can one help being filled with indignation at the fact that, 
in the whole of that incessant correspondence exchanged 
between the Committee and the Temple, nobody troubled 
themselves about the orphan sister, nor authorised or 
solicited an infraction of that pitiless regulation which had 
separated the two children for twenty months past.'' No! 
There was nothing but the stern exigency to hide at all 
cost the prisoner's death until the moment came when it 
might be divulged without danger. 

259 



THE DAUPHIN 

Wliat they wanted was to gain a few hours. During 
the night Lasne and Gomin again sent word to the Com- 
mittee that "everything was in a state of the greatest 
security," but a feeling of anxiety remained. What was 
to be done next day at noon when the Civic Commissioner 
who was to replace Damont arrived at the Temple.^ It 
would, indeed, be necessary to inform him of the death 
of the child and perhaps he would be less compliant or 
more perspicacious than Damont — "We beg you," wrote 
the jailors, "to send us instructions as to the line of 
conduct we are to assume towards this Commissioner." 
The Committee replied: "The service must be continued 
as usual until otherwise deliberated ^ on," for it had taken 
its precautions and was no longer uneasy. When the 
new Commissioner arrived they might show him the body, 
for such measures had been taken that from that moment 
the dead child would be unrecognisable. 



In fact, the next day, June 9th, the morning passed at 
the Temple without any modification in the theme of the 
comedy begun the night before. But at a quarter past 
eleven ^ Pelletan and Dumangin, accompanied by their 
colleagues Lassus ^ and Jeanroy,^ arrived to perform the 
autopsy. Lasne and Gomin immediately ^ introduced 
them into the death chamber. With them entered Damont 
and also the turnkey Gourlet, the only one of the em- 
ployes of the Tower who had been informed of the death. 
The doctors questioned Lasne and Gomin. "Is this child 
the son of Louis Capet? Is he the child given you to 
guard?" Both replied affirmatively. Damont, next ques- 
tioned, stated that it was indeed the child he had seen 

^Temple Register. 

'To-day, the 21st of Prairial, at a quarter past eleven A. M. 
there arrived . . ." Temple Register. 

'Professor of legal medicine at the Ecole de Saute of Paris. 

■•Professor at the medical schools of Paris. 

^"At a quarter past eleven," according to the Temple Register; 
"at half past eleven," according to the report of the autopsy. 

260 



OUTSIDE THE TEMPLE 

the day before "sick and living," and that he recognised 
him through having formerly met him several times in 
the Tuileries, when his duty as a National Guardsman 
took him there. Gourlet attested that he had known 
little Capet "since his arrival at the Temple," in August, 
1792. — "These questions having been put, the officers of 
health proceeded to their operation." ^ 

About that same hour, at the other end of Paris, the 
Convention had just opened its sitting. Immediately, 
Achille Sevestre, representative for Ille-et-Vilaine and a 
member of the Committee of General Safety ^ for two 
months past, appeared in the Tribune. He read a very 
short report, announcing, in terms of studied dryness, that 
the son of Capet, indisposed for some time past through 
a swelling on his right knee and left wrist, had died the 
evening before and that the Committee had received the 
news at a quarter past two in the afternoon. "The Com- 
mittee," he added, "has instructed me to inform you of 
it. Everything is established. Here are the reports, 
which will remain deposited in the Archives." He then 
passed to the reading of a letter from Nice relating the 
arrest of a hundred emigres.^ . . . 

Sevestre, a former Clerk of the Court to the tribunal 
of Rennes, had certainly lost, in the exercise of his duties 
as a legislator, that respect for minute precision which is 
dear to lawyers, for his report contains as many inaccu- 
racies as lines. He states, for instance, that the Commit- 
tee heard of the death of the boy Capet ^ at a quarter past 
two on the 20th; why did he not set forth the reasons 
which prevented the said Committee from immediately in- 
forming the Convention, which had not concluded its 

^Temple Register. 

=He joined the Committee on the 15th of Germinal, year III. 

'Moniteur. Reprint, Vol. XXIV, p. 650. 

^According to the Temple Register the death occurred "at 3 o'clock." 
It is very possible that Gomin, who carried the news of it to the 
Tuileries, arrived there just at the moment the Convention had 
broken up. 

261 



THE DAUPHIN 

sitting before four o'clock.^ A simple piece of thought- 
lessness. What was less excusable was Sevestre's gesture, 
pretending to handle a bundle of papers and saying: 
"everything is established . . . here are the reports. 
. . .'* At the time he was speaking the Committee was 
not yet in possession either of the declaration or of the 
certificate of death, or of the post-mortem certificate, or 
of the copy from the Temple Register, or of anything 
which resembled a report or a statement whatsoever; and 
it did not appear, indeed, that it ever had the intention 
of forming a file of official documents confirmative of the 
event. But they wished to be peremptory in order to cut 
short any discussion. The deputies, amazed by the an- 
nouncement of this unexpected news, remained "dumb with 
astonishment." — "Not a word of pity, not an expression 
of regret came from that assembly of wretches, impene- 
trable to all feeling, to all sense of honour, to any re- 
morse." ^ This was the second regicide to be set to the 
account of the Convention ; for, whoever the child — 
anonymous or Bourbon, — whose body was at the Temple, 
may have been, whatever doubts may have henceforth 
been firmly established in many minds, it was, indeed, 
the royal personality of Louis XVII who had just disap- 
peared with this doubtful prisoner, consecrated, in de- 
fault of authentic titles by misfortune, griefs, the unani- 
mous and secret pity of the people, and the tragic gran- 
deur of his short history; — an investiture too touching 
not to be unshakable, in comparison with which any com- 
petition was condemned in advance to remain vain. 

At the Temple they worked in such a way that the pre- 
meditated juggling should be effected without giving 
rise to scandal. When the guard was relieved at noon 
the new Commissioner, Darlot, the delegate of the Reunion 
section, arrived. After the usual formalities,^ he was in- 

^Moniteur. Reprint, Vol. XXIV, p. 650. Correspondence. 
"Mallet du Pan's, Berne, June 27th. 

'Presentation of the letter of the Administrative Commission, of 
the extract from the nomination by the Civic Committee of the Reunion 

262 



OUTSIDE THE TEMPLE 

troduced into the council room, to which Damont, Lasne, 
and Gomin, leaving the surgeons to their work, had de- 
scended to receive him. Either because they felt some 
embarrassment, or because they sought to gain still more 
time, "some time" passed before Lasne and Gomin set 
forth to the new-comer "the serious motive'* for which 
Damont, who ought to have left the Temple on Darlot's 
arrival, was still there, "although his duties were over." — 
"Louis Capet's son had died the day before at three in 
the afternoon." ^ And immediately they invited Darlot 
to ascend to the second floor, which he did, and entered 
the anteroom where "four citizens, busy writing, rose as 
soon as he appeared." These were the doctors, already 
setting down their observations, or drawing up the pre- 
liminaries of their report. They led Darlot into the ad- 
joining room, where the little body, covered with a sheet, 
was lying on a folding bed. One of the surgeons raised 
the shroud and Darlot, "greatly struck" by the appear- 
ance of the face, "which was not yet in any way disfig- 
ured," very frankly attested "that he remembered this 
dead child very well through having several times seen him 
walking in the Tuileries Gardens, with all the pomp of the 
son of Louis Capet, and in the little garden where there 
were rabbits." ^ This most precise declaration appeared 
so opportune that hardly had they descended to the coun- 
cil room than Lasne and Gomin pressed Darlot to put it 
down in writing, duly signed and witnessed. A very singu- 
lar precaution that could only be explainable if some in- 

section, and of the Commissioner's citizenship card. Darlot's declara- 
tion. National Archives, BB 30, 964. This document, like the im- 
portant copy of the Register, is reproduced in fac-simile in Francois 
Laurentie, Louis XVII. 

^This clearly proves that, until the autopsy was begun, Lasne, 
Gomin and Damont had continued to keep the child's death secret. 
If they had announced it to the prison staff on the morning of 
June 9th, Darlot would have learnt it on his arrival at the first 
guardhouse, as much from the guards as from the turnkeys and 
doorkeepers who accompanied him, or before whom he had to pass 
when entering, from the main entrance in the Rue du Temple as 
far as the Tower. 

^Darlot's declaration. 



THE DAUPHIN 

credulity had been shown by the prison staff. But this 
could not be, since nobody in the Temple was yet informed 
of the prisoner's death, which was to be made known at 
the same time as the result of the autopsy ! How is it 
that the jailors took it upon themselves to invite this 
obliging Commissioner to make this formal but stupid 
declaration? Most stupid, indeed, for the anxiety to 
thus authenticate the personality of the dead by a chance 
witness proves there was authorisation for doubting it. 
Moreover, Darlot's attestation permits one to suppose 
that Damont and Gourlet, having, like him, recognised 
the Dauphin, had likewise been requested to set down a 
similar declaration. They did not do so. Did they re- 
fuse? And then, we also recall the remarks formerly 
made before Hue and Frotte by important members of 
the Convention, who depicted the prisoner of the Temple as 
being transformed by stupidity, "depraved, physically 
and morally," become an object of disgust. ... If, when 
still living, he was unrecognisable by Frotte and by Hue, 
the latter of whom had lived with the Dauphin at the 
Temple itself, how could a little citizen of Paris who had 
never seen him except at a distance, in the days of the 
Tuileries, recognise the features of the little prince on 
that face set by death? 

Meanwhile the four practitioners continued their 
mournful work, Lasne ^ and Damont entering from time to 
time. Pelletan alone proceeded to open the body,^ which 
was stretched on a table in that anteroom where for- 
merly the Dauphin had so often played. It was Pelletan 
also who sawed, "on a level with the sockets, the skull, 
previously stripped of all its hair and skin, cut and turned 
back in four triangular sections ;" and it was he also who, 
the operation over, "restored" the body, replaced the 

^Lasne's Narrative to Antoine de Saint-Gervais. Preuves autherir- 
tiques ... p. 50. 
^Letter from Pelletan to Dumangin. Preuves authentiques, p. 55. 

264 



OUTSIDE THE TEMPLE 

viscera, sponged, plugged, and tightened the bandages. 
As his colleagues, as well as "the jailors," had withdrawn 
to the deep window ^ recess, doubtless to get out of the 
way of the noxious odor, Pelletan profited by their absence 
to take possession, surreptitiously, of "a few precious re- 
mains." He rolled the child's heart in a napkin and put 
it in his pocket. To finish, he turned back the strips of 
loose skin on to the skull, brought them together by a 
few skilful stitches, wrapped the whole "bald" head with 
a piece of linen or a cotton cap, which he fixed under the 
chin or at the back of the neck,^ and, the dead, boy's curls 
remaining there, waiting to be swept up, he allowed Da- 
mont to take and carry them off without any of those 
present appearing to be aware of the subtraction. At 
half past four everything was over and the body, carried 
back into the bedroom, was placed on one of the beds.'^ 
The doctors then left the Temple, where their visit, which 
could not remain unperceived either by the officers, or by 
the soldiers on guard, or by the steward Lienard, or by the 
employes or servants of the house, was doubtless adroitly 
explained as a simple but very long consultation. 

For — and this is almost unbelievable — the secret was 
still kept ! — "The death was concealed," writes Damont, 
"for the rest of the day — the 8th — and the next day until 
the arrival of four deputies. '^'' ■* Now, the deputies did not 
arrive until eleven o'clock on the night ^ of the 9th, and 
they were not four in number but only two, Kervelegan 
and Bergoing, delegated by the Committee of General 

'Letter from Pelletan to Dumangin. Preuves authentiques, p. 56. 

'Pelletan's declaration. National Archives, BB 30, 964:, published 
by Dr. Bienvenu in Medecine international illustrSe. 

'The report of the autopsy seems to have been written as the 
observations vi'ere being made and consequently to the dictation of 
Pelletan, who may call himself its author. "In truth," wrote Du- 
mangin to him later, "you only did your part like each of us. Four 
copies of an original were made and all were signed by we four. 
One was sent to the Committee of General Safety, MM. Lassus, 
Jeanroy, you and I each kept our own. Preuves authentiques, p. 55. 

*Damont's declaration. 

'Temple Register, report of the day of the 21st of Prairial (June 
9th). 

265 



THE DAUPHIN 

Safety "to assure the execution of various decrees con- 
cerning Capet fils." They entered the council room, ex- 
amined the register, collated the copy of the report of 
the autopsy, which had already been entered in it, with 
the original in their possession, and, having found that 
the entries were all in order, decided that the moment had 
come to give "the event the greatest publicity." As the 
news of little Capet's death immediately spread and put 
the staff in a great flutter, the representatives declared 
"that too much importance must not be attached to it. 
That he would be buried quite simply" ; ^ and having as- 
sembled the staff, consisting on that day of the comman- 
der, adjutant, captain, lieutenant, second lieutenant and 
sergeant,^ they requested them to file before the body 
and themselves headed the column, which proceeded up 
the staircase. They entered the room altogether and 
caught a glimpse, by the light of a candle or lantern, of 
the slender tightly bandaged corpse "the whole of llie 
head of which was covered with a piece of linen or a cotton 
cap fixed under the chin or at the back of the neck." Was 
this covering raised? That is hardly probable. All 
present, asked to declare whether they recognised the son 
of the tyrant in these lamentable remains, declared that 
they recognised him ^ "through having seen him," Damont 
specifies, "in the Tuileries Gardens and elsewhere." They 
then complacently signed their attestation. What sur- 
prises one still more is that the declaration of these sol- 
diers was presented and received as a decisive argument, 
doing away with all uncertainty and proving the death of 
the son of Louis XVI in the Temple.^ Since the Commit- 

'Damont's narrative. 

^Namely citizens Bourgeois, Commander of the armed force of the 
Fid61it6 section, Lucas, Adjutant, Ratreaux, Captain, Seguin, Lieu- 
tenant, Droits de I'Homme section, Normand, Second Lieutenant, 
Homme arme section, Vieillaume, Sergeant, Arces section. 

^Temple Register. 

*It is not without utility to point out that this comedy appeared 
to certain historians to be so inadmissible that they thought fit to 
invert the order of the incidents in order to give it more an air of 
greater probability. Beauchesne and Chautelause, among others, 

266 



OUTSIDE THE TEMPLE 

tee of General Safety attached so much importance to the 
solemn establishment of the little King's identity, why 
did it not convene, before the autopsy, the witnesses it 
had at hand? First of all there was Madame Roy ale, 
whose affirmation would have been decisive; there was 
Tison who had lived with the Dauphin for fourteen 
months ; there were Meunier, the head cook, and Baron, 
the doorkeeper of the Tower, both of them on duty at the 
Temple since the beginning of the captivity. From these 
the body was hidden, to appeal to passers by who had 
not seen the Dauphin for four to five years past, and to 
them was shown, in semi-darkness, a shaven head, a sawed 
skull, or a covered face! 



The Republic was not disembarrassed. Louis XVII 
was officially dead. The rest was but a formality. It 
was as the son of Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette that 
the dead boy was to be inscribed on June 10th at the 
Temple itself — on the records of the Registrar charged, 
according to law, "to verify death by an inspection of 
the body." On that day honest Meunier, who conscien- 
tiously kept the beef tea and chicken broth ordered for 
the little patient ever ready on his stoves, learning that 
his broth was useless, gave it to Fere Lefebvre, who kept 
a refreshment bar in the big courtyard of the palace.^ The 
news of the death quickly spread in the Temple quarter 
and found many disbelievers. The newspapers, on an- 
nouncing it, did not fail to report strange rumours which 
were afloat.^ — "Some contend that this death means noth- 
ing, that the young child is full of life, that it is a very 
long time since he was at the Temple. . . . The authen- 
ticity of the secret and natural death of a child whom, 

placed the recognition before the autopsy, but are thus in contra- 
diction with the Temple Register and diary, which they do not seem to 
have utilised. 

^Lefebvre's declaration. Laurentie, loc cit. 

'Courrier universal of June 13th (the 25th of Brairial). 

267 



THE DAUPHIN 

notwithstanding all demagogic declarations, one cannot 
regard as an ordinary child, since, instead of running 
about at liberty in the streets, like the son of sans-cu- 
lotte, a considerable armed force guarded him day and 
night, ought perhaps, I will not say for the honour of the 
Convention, but for public tranquillity, ought to have been 
solemnly and publicly ascertained. . . .'* A police bulle- 
tin of the 22nd of Prairial (June 10th) ran as follows: — 
"If the bulletins of his illness, as is the custom, had been 
sent to the Convention daily, an infinity of slanderous or 
even calumnious misstatements would have been avoided. 
. . ." ^ What astonished people was the suddenness of 
the decease. Nobody knew that the Dauphin was indis- 
posed; there had been no mention of his illness, either at 
the Convention, or in the newspapers, or even at the 
Temple, all the rumours of which were known and com- 
mented upon in consequence of the great movement of na- 
tional guards and tradesmen who came and left there 
daily. Suddenly, all these people learnt that he was dead 
and that the surgeons had opened him. . . . This ap- 
peared suspicious, and popular imagination was given 
free course. 



On the 10th, at noon, Darlot's duty came to an end. 
He was replaced by Guerin, civic commissioner of the 
Homme arme section. Lasne received him in the council 
chamber, according to the protocol, and informed him 
of the prisoner's death. ^ More wide awake than his two 
preceding colleagues, Guerin noticed, from the very first 
moments of his installation, that, "the news of the death 
not having been preceded by any announcement of illness, 
a fact which might give place to vexatious conjectures," 

^Tableau de la revolution. Schmidt, Vol. II, p. 355. 

'Guerin has left a narrative of his twenty-four hours' duty at 
the Temple from the 10th of June at noon to the 11th of Jane at the 
same hour. His account is published by Dupre-Lasalle in Discours 
et requisitiones, 1 Vol. in 8°, 1886. 

268 



OUTSIDE THE TEMPLE 

the two jailors Lasne and Gomin "sought to divert the 
effect by every means which prudence suggested to them." 
They were, indeed, very busy, for the Committee of Gen- 
eral Safety, after so many subtleties and irregularities, 
now affected a great respect for legal formalities and or- 
dered that they be strictly observed. In the afternoon, 
about half past four a special messenger arrived at the 
Temple with a decree which it had just issued, ordering 
the civilian committee of the Temple section "to bury the 
son of Louis Capet in the ordinary place and according 
to the usual forms, in the presence of the number of wit- 
nesses specified by law and supplemented by two members 
of the civilian committee of the said section.^ Whilst 
Lasne or Gomin informed the section, notice was sent at 
the same time to Voisin, the conductor of funeral proces- 
sions, who carried out the duties of manager of such 
ceremonies. So he went to citizen Bureau, doorkeeper of 
the Sainte-Marguerite cemetery to order a cofBn "for a 
young girl." Bureau supplied him with a shell "of white 
wood," four feet and a half long.^ 

At half past seven everything was ready. Public officer 
Robin presented himself with his register and accompanied 
by two supplementary commissioners, Arnault and Gobet, 
ordered to attend the burial. The declaration of death 
was set down in the presence of the body. Lasne and 
Gomin figured in it as declarants ; the others signed : 
Then, "to surround the declaration with a still greater 
number of testimonies," the military staff on guard since 
noon was brought to the deathbed and the officers were 
invited "to declare if they recognised the son of Louis." 
Like their comrades of the day before, all recognised him 
and signed the register accordingly.^ At that moment a 

*The text of this decree is published in A. Begis's Louis XVII, sa 
mort dans la tour du Temple. 

'One metre forty-five centimetres. The average stature of children 
of 10 in Paris is, according to the statistics of M. Alphonse Bertillon, 
1 metre 276 milimetres. 

'Gu6rin's narrative. 

869 



THE DAUPHIN 

police inspector came with the news that, in view of the 
burial of little Capet, a large crowd was gathering at the 
entrance to the Temple. Guerin at once sent an order 
post-haste to the section for "two detachments of twenty 
to twenty-five men" to keep back the crowd. The day 
was declining. Voisin, the conductor, took the little 
corpse in his arms and descended with his light burden 
to the bottom of the long stone staircase, where the coffin 
was placed. He then stretched out the body in the coffin, 
which remained open for one hour whilst the troops dis- 
persed the idlers who, "out of curiosity or perhaps for 
some other motive," ^ had gathered in the Rue du Temple. 
Not until 9 o'clock at night,^ when it was almost dark, did 
Dusser, the Commissary of Police, give the order for de- 
parture. Voisin nailed up the coffin, threw "a pall" over 
it and handed it over to the bearers, who, four in number, 
relieved one another "two by two" ^ whilst en route. Lasne 
and Gomin followed as well as Brigadier Garnier and 
Captain Wallon,* commander of the prison guard, Guerin, 
the commissioner of the day, Arnault and Godet, the 
two occasional commissioners and Dusser, the commissary 
of police. There was also present a person whose un- 
justified presence, it seems, was unperceived, which has 
since then raised many comments, which have remained, 
however, without a useful solution. This person was Remy 
Bigot. Although his name does not appear on any of the 
lists of the Commune we saw him come on guard at the 
Temple, in the capacity of a member of the General Coun- 
cil, on January 21st, 1794, when, after Simon's departure, 
the sequestration of the little prisoner began.^ Bigot re- 
appeared — by what right? — at the burial, as though some 

■Gu6rin. 

'Voisin. 

'Report of the removal of the body of the son of Louis Capet, 
Archives by the Hotel de Ville. Notice hiatorique sur la chapelle 
expiatoiore by the Abbe Savornin, 1865, 

*Both of the Montreuil section, 

'Bigot — if it is the same man — returned to the Temple on January 
30th and March 1st, 1794. 

^70 




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O O 3 

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3 few 

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OUTSIDE THE TEMPLE 

mysterious necessity imposed his interference in the im- 
portant circumstances of the captivity in the Temple. He 
signed that evening the report of the removal of the 
body ; ^ and two days later appeared again as a witness 
to the death certificate, in which he declared himself to be 
an "employe, aged 57, domiciled at 61 Rue Vieille-du- 
Temple, a friend of the deceased." " 

The little procession, escorted by eight soldiers, com- 
manded by a sergeant, left the Temple by the main portal 
and almost immediately turned to the left into the Rue 
de la Corderie. A barrier of troops kept back the crowd. 

^The Abbe Savornin, loc. cit., p. 318. 

'An attempt has been made, by manipulating the dates a little, 
to explain the presence of the enigmatic Bigot on June 10th, the day 
of the burial, and on June 12th, the day of the drawing up at 
the Hotel de Ville of the death certificate, which must not be con- 
fused with the provisional declaration made on the 10th at the 
Temple itself. If Remy Bigot was, in June, 1795, civic commissioner 
of the Droit I'Homme section, it would, indeed, have been very 
natural that he should have been chosen to mount guard at the 
prison; but this duty did not last more than twenty- four hours and, 
according to the very terms of the decree of the Committee of 
General Safety, quoted above, page 213, it could not be renewed 
twice in the same year. Now, the text of the Temple Register is 
very precise: The Commissioners on duty were, on the 8th (the 20th 
of Prairial), the day of the death, Damont, on June 9th (the 
21st of Prairial), the day of the autopsy, Darlot, and on June 10th 
(22nd of Prairial), the day of the burial, Guerin, to whom were 
added two occasional commissioners, Arnoult and Godet, furnished 
by the Temple section. Bigot does not figure, then, officially for 
any of these three days. By what right, then, did he sign the report 
for the removal of the body, and how is it he returned, two days 
later, to the H6tel de Ville to sign the death certificate? Admitting 
he was commissioner on the 12th, he was not on the 10th; if he 
were commissioner on the 10th, he was not on the 12th. Moreover, 
he would not have failed to add to his signature, as all the others 
did, the mention: Commissioner on duty at the Temple. He was 
not present in that quality, but in that of a friend of the deceased, 
and this again is singular, for Gomin and Lasne, having signed 
"the declaration of death," ought also to have figured as signers 
of the "death certificate," the declaration forms having the following 
notice printed in the margin: "citizens who have made this declara- 
tion are obliged to have the certificate drawn up at the Maison 
Commune within twenty- four hours, under penalty of being punished 
according to the law." Let us pass over the question of the twenty- 
four hours, which has been discussed at great length, and ask our- 
selves why Gomin abstained from being a witness to the death cer- 
tificate as he had been to the declaration. Who was this Bigot 
who took his place? A deep study of the civic committees would 
perhaps elucidate this problem better than one can do it here. 

271 



THE DAUPHIN 

Two detachments of twenty-five men followed the bearers 
"a fair distance behind, without appearing to form part 
of the cortege," ^ and the cemetery adjoining Sainte 
Marguerite's church, at a distance of nearly half a league 
from the Temple, was reached without difficulty. The 
route was covered rapidly, for it was hardly half past 
nine when the convoy, issuing from the Rue Basfroy 
reached the Rue Saint Bernard. It passed before the 
closed gate of the cemetery and entered the church,^ trans- 
formed into a school for "the pupils of the Salpetre." A 
door in the left aisle, opened on to the cemetery which 
they entered almost at nightfall — a beautiful clear night 
at the end of spring.' 

It was a little enclosure verdant with that thick grass 
which grows over the dead and with old trees along the 
walls. A tumble down old place with a slate roof and 
windows protected with iron bars was hidden away in 
one corner and served as a habitation for the grave 
digger Betrancourt and his wife. The common grave, 
known as "the trench" among professionals, stretched 
from east to west in the middle of the ground, passing at 
the foot of a tall and old stone column formerly sur- 
mounted by a cross, which must have fallen and been 
thrown somewhere in the thick grass. The burial of the 
prisoner was without ceremonial. Twenty years later 
the grave-digger's wife related the event as follows : — ■ 
"They buried him in the dusk ; it was not yet quite night. 
There were very few people. I could easily draw near, and 
I saw the coffin as I see you. They put it in the common 
grave, which was the grave of everybody, the little and 
the big people, the poor and the rich. All went there be- 
cause so to speak, everybody was equal. . . ." ^ Com- 

'Guerin. 

^Narrative of Bureau, doorkeeper of the cemetery. We are here 
following the texts reproduced by M. Lambeau, loc. cit. 

^The observatory bulletin notes: 9:30, clear sky. Two hours later 
"there rose a great wind." 

"Peuchet. M4moires de tous. Quoted by L. Lambeau, 



OUTSIDE THE TEMPLE 

missary of police Dusser placed a sentry near the grave 
and another at the entrance to the cemetery. The eight 
people present signed.^ Everything was over by ten 
o'clock.^ Lasne and Gomin turned their steps towards 
the prison.^ What confidences and reflections did they ex- 

^This refers to the report of the burial, reproduced by L. Lambeau, 
p. 105. 

-But they also drew up a report of the removal of the body which 
the Abbe Savornin published in La Chapelle expiatoire, in accordance 
with the original preserved in the Archives of the Hotel de Ville, 
and which bears only the signatures of Dusser, Lasne and Bigot. 
Later, Damont wrote: "I was asked by those who were drawing up 
the death certificate, near the cemetery, to be one of the six witnesses, 
but I refused under the pretext that at that hour I ought to have been 
at my post." This was, as we shall see, pure bragging on the part 
of Damont, who sought to give himself importance. He was due to 
leave the Temple on the 9th at noon, so that one is authorised to 
doubt that he continued his duty there beyond the time fixed upon, 
for it was not the Committee of General Safety who invited him 
there as he pretends. The Temple Register is very clear on that 
point. It is true that Damont adds at the end of his declaration: 
"The indiscretion of the Commissioner who came to replace me next 
day was the cause of my doing two days' duty in succession near the 
princess — (Madame Royale) — and the King's valet" — (Tison) — which 
is a denial of his first statement. Damont prolonged his stay at 
the Temple simply because Lasne and Gomin, wishing to keep the 
prisoner's death secret, would not allow this chatterer to leave the 
prison where he was confined, like Gourlet, and even for a short 
time like Pelletan. He was present at the funeral as a simple 
spectator and nobody asked him to sign a document on which his 
name could not figure in any capacity. 

^The following account of this nocturnal burial was given in 1815 
by its organiser, Voisin, and certain details, for which room could not 
be found in our narrative, will be found in it: "In my capacity as 
conductor, I was requested by the authorities on the 24th of Prairial, 
year III (sic. instead of the 22nd) at nine p. m., to proceed to 
the Temple to bury the body of the unfortunate prince; in which I 
was assisted by M. du Cerf (sic, for Dusser), Commissioner of 
the section and by an officer whose name I do not know. Assisted 
by four bearers, who suffered a death as tragic as the three doctors*, 
I was so convinced that I was carrying the body of Louis XVII 
that, having placed him in the coffin marked by me at the head and 
foot with the letter D, in charcoal, I had the prince taken in his 
unclosed coffin and had him brought down to the foot of the stair- 
case where he remained about an hour. I could not fasten up the 
box, feeling very well that the noise of the nailing down would 
have filled the august princess who inhabited the same floor (sic) 

*Voisin here alludes to the death of Dr. Desault, followed a few 
days later by the decease of two other doctors, Chopart and Doublet. 
Chopart, it is true, was very intimate with Desault, but one cannot 
see that either he or Doublet were ever summoned to the Temple. 

273 



THE DAUPHIN 

change along the route? Whatever may have been their 
doubts, of which their conduct furnishes so many indica- 
tions, they possessed at least one certainty, that the little 
King — whom perhaps they had never had to guard — was 
now most decidedly outside the Temple. 

with sorrow. "At the moment of departure I had the coffin nailed 
up and did not leave it. On reaching the gate, the representatives 
of the people (sic), fearing a popular riot, wished me to leave by 
a side door; but in my capacity as conductor, I was opposed to 
it and so we passed through the large gateway to reach the Sainte 
Marguerite parish cemetery, where I had a private grave opened. 
I covered it up my§elf with earth." . . . etc. Archives of the pre- 
fecture of Police. (Burial of Louis XVII and search for his tomb.) 



274 



vn 



AT RANDOM 



At the beginning of the autumn of that year, 1795, 
a farmer of the town of La Poueze, in Anjou, called at 
the headquarters of the Royal army of the West ^ and 
asked for an interview with Vicomte de Scepeaux, the 
Commander-in-Chief, and Comte de Chatillon, the second 
in command. He related to them that he had received 
at his house a child who said he was the son of a lord of 
the manor of the left bank of the Loire, Baron de Vesins, 
who had disappeared since the rout of the army of the 
Vendee in 1793. Setting forth that he was not suffi- 
ciently well-to-do "to treat the child as his birth de- 
manded," the countryman asked that they find for him a 
refuge where he would be received and sheltered in a 
manner more in conformity with his rank. MM. de Sce- 
peaux and de Chatillon immediately took an interest in 
the lot of this little abandoned boy and sent one of their 
aides-de-camp, Charles de Turpin, to the Chateau of 
Angrie, inhabited by his aunt, the Vicomtesse de Turpin 
de Crisse, to beg her to receive "young Vesins" and keep 
him with her until he found his family. Mme. de Turpin 
willingly consented to this and immediately instructed 
her confidential man, Moulard, to fetch the child from 
headquarters, which he did the same day. 

The Vicomtesse de Turpin de Crisse ^ was a woman of 
high character, "endowed with great energy, courage, 

*0n the announcement of the Dauphin's death in the Temple, 
Charette had taken up arms again. The Royal army of Anjou had 
followed the movement of the Vendee and the whole of the west of 
France was again in insurrection. 

'N6e Jeanne Elizabeth de Bongars. Her husband, a lieutenant in 
the body-guard of Monsieur, brother of Louis XVI, had emigrated 
in 1791. 

275 



THE DAUPHIN 

and intelligence," ^ She had largely contributed to the 
pacification of the preceding year and was esteemed by 
Royalist leaders and Republican Generals alike. Both, 
on many occasions had testified their "general gratitude 
in the name of the French people" to her, and expressed 
their congratulations "for the ser\'ices she had rendered 
the country." ^ Since the resumption of hostilities she was 
settled at the Chateau of Angrie, which belonged to her 
nephew, Charles de Turpin, and this ancient lordly resi- 
dence had become a place of refuge for emigres officers, 
who, in their destitution, found there, in addition to se- 
curity, due to the great reputation of the lady of the 
house, "all the resources one might expect from a noble 
and generous hospitality." ^ 

The child recommended by MM. Scepeaux and de Cha- 
tillon received, then, a hearty welcome. Mme. de Turpin 
de Crisse "came to meet him in the courtyard." The boy 
was "somewhat ashamed of his poor clothes" and had 
"an uneasy" air. The Vicomtesse reassured him, urged 
him not to consider that he was among strangers, and, 
to dispel his embarrassment, advised him to occupy him- 
self with "some little game." On hearing this, the child 
began to cry, saying that, "since he had seen his mother 
perish, he took no further pleasure in amusement." Mme. 
de Turpin augured "well from so good a disposition." 
The next day she called in the tailor and ordered for her 
young guest a little grey coat of fine cloth with black 
revers, similar to the uniform of the royalist leaders. 
He ate, of course, at the table of the lady of the chateau 
and was somewhat shy "the first time" ; but in a few days 
"he got quite accustomed to all the usages" of the new 
world in which he was to live. Only, "he took unfair 

^Mimoires relatifs aux differentes missions royalistes de Madame 
la vicomtesse Turpin de Crisse by Alphonse de Beauchamp, in the 
M^moires secrets et inedits pour servir a I'histoire contemporaine, 
Vol. II. 

'Beauchamp, loc. cit. 

'The same. 

276 



AT RANDOM 

advantage of the complaisance of the servants and put 
them out of patience," He was, moreover, rebellious to 
all study. Mme. de Turpin undertook to teach him read- 
ing, writing, arithmetic and the catechism; but, though 
he was intelligent, she always found him "inattentive, 
bored and with a horror of application." 

Visitors to the Chateau of Angrie were numerous. It 
was, in a way, a place of refuge to which passing emigres 
came in search of a little respite. Little "de Vesins" 
showed himself familiar towards them. One day, a certain 
M. de la Mouriciere, doubtless puzzled by his presence, 
questioned him at too great a length and with too much 
curiosity, whereupon the child showed his impatience by 
kicking his indiscreet interlocutor. This time, Mme. de 
Turpin considered that she ought to put her foot down, 
so she punished the boy by locking him up "in a room 
which at the end of the house, looked onto the moat." 
When the door closed upon him he began to shout a good 
deal, threatening not only to tear up everything which 
came within reach but to throw himself out of the window. 
Soon it looked as though he had decided to be reasonable, 
for not a sound could be heard. The lady of the chateau, 
already somewhat anxious, then told him through the 
door that she was ready to forgive him if he would 
apologise to M. de la Mouriciere. Receiving no reply, 
she spoke to him again, but once more without success. It 
was then that, "seized with fear" at the thought that the 
prisoner had escaped through the window and fallen into 
the moat, she opened the door and with her guests rushed 
into the room. . . . The boy had disappeared. Mme. de 
Turpin was terrified and her guests entirely lost their 
heads, but by dint of searching Charles de Turpin, look- 
ing under a bed, discovered the little rascal very well 
satisfied with his vengeance and delighted to have given 
so much trouble to his benefactress, a trouble which, 
caused by the simple roguishness of a child, may appear 
excessive, for the people of those days lived in a state of 

277 



THE DAUPHIN 

perpetual alarm and must have been accustomed to 
strong emotions. 

From one end of the country to the other, in those early 
months of the Government of the Directory, one heard 
of nothing else, in fact, but armed robberies, abductions, 
brigandage, murders, pillage and disappearances. One 
of these crimes which remained, like so many others, un- 
punished is connected — as has only recently been discov- 
ered — with certain episodes of the complex Louis XVII 
affair. We have not forgotten, perhaps, that Barras pre- 
tended that he had replaced by a substitute and handed 
to Petitval, the owner of the Chateau of Vitry-sur-Seine, 
the child he had found at the Temple on the 10th of Ther- 
midor, thus fulfilling a promise made to the royalist finan- 
cier in return for his pecuniary assistance when prepar- 
ing the downfall of Robespierre.^ Petitval was a per- 
fectly honest and greatly esteemed man and was not 
known to possess a single enemy. Immensely rich, he 
assisted "with much generosity and cordiality persons of 
importance who were in need." He it was, as we have 
seen, whom Malesherbes, after the death of Louis XVI, 
had entrusted on the king's orders with the interests of 
the Dauphin ; and in handing over the prisoner to him 
Barras — it is important to recall the fact — took "neces- 
sary precautions to prevent the child being abducted" and 
stipulated "that he should always remain at the disposal 
of the Convention." 

W^hat happened after Petitval received his "pledge?" 
Nobody has ever known, and over that sojourn at Vitry 
there hovers a shadow as dark as that which enveloped 
the Temple after Simon's departure. We, are, therefore, 
reduced, if not to hypotheses, which would be vain, at 
least to reasoning, and that silence of Vitry-sur-Seine is 
explained if the banker recognised that the young guest 
placed in his hands was not the son of Louis XVI. In 

^"We had recourse to his purse when it was necessary to prepare 
the Thermidorian revolution." 

278 



AT RANDOM 

that case he would have thought that he had been tricked 
by Barras, who would have replied by alleging his good 
faith. He had undertaken to hand over the prisoner of 
the Temple. Was it his fault if that prisoner were no 
longer the Dauphin? But a scandal must be avoided; 
it was not possible that those people, whoever they might 
be, at whose house the little prince was hidden could con- 
ceal him very long. So Petitval agreed to wait. But 
months passed; the substitute who was at the Temple 
died; and it became indeed necessary to declare him at 
the registrar's and bury him under the name of the son 
of Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette. Whereupon the 
banker became indignant. He had received the mission 
"to establish judicial proof of the substitution and re- 
store to the little King his legal existence," and now in 
addition it was necessary for him "to endeavour to obtain 
the cancelling of a death certificate which he declared 
was a forgery" ^ and this to the advantage of an un- 
known boy whom the success of his steps would make 
King of France ! As a good royalist, Petitval refused 
to play this part in a comedy which he considered sacri- 
legious and to retain in his house the child whom he would 
certainly not have relinquished if that child had been the 
Dauphin, in which case the banker would have given proof 
of loyalty, but would also have shown great imprudence, 
for the Barrases, the Fouches, the Roveres, the Talliens, 
the Frerons — and others — now knew that he was in pos- 
session of their secret and feared the probity of this honest 
accomplice. 

These are mere explanations — ^hazardous ones we must 
confess of the following brutal fact. On the morning 
of April 21st, 1796, the inhabitants of the Chateau of 
Vitry-sur-Seine did not wake up. They were all dead. 
Mme. Duchambon, Petitval's mother-in-law, lay in her 
bed with her throat cut. Two of her lady friends stop- 
ping at the chateau, as well as two lady's maids, had 

^Revue historique, loc. cit. pp. 74-75. 

279 



THE DAUPHIN 

been massacred by sabre cuts, the head of one of them 
being separated from the body. Petitval's body, with 
shattered skull, was discovered on a pathway of the park. 
His valet-de-cJiamhre had been struck down on the steps 
leading to the front door. . . . Altogether "eight or 
nine persons had perished." Several servants, who had 
hidden themselves or run away, had survived, including 
a waiting maid who, wild with terror, had passed through 
the band of assassins, carrying in her arms a young child, 
Petitval's son. Nothing had been stolen from the chateau. 
The newspapers mentioned this butchery ^ very sum- 
marily, and we should know nothing more on the subject 
if we did not possess the report of the secret sitting of the 
Directory ^ at which the causes and circumstances of the 
murder were discussed. Ah ! the five directors had no 
flattering illusions regarding certain of their former col- 
leagues of the Convention ! They agreed in charging with 
the Vitry-sur-seine assassination the representatives who, 
after having received Petitval's money, had knowingly 
lured him on. The banker had threatened to denounce 
publicly the shameless swindle of which he was the vic- 
tim. Rewbel stated the matter clearly: — "Petitval has 
been killed, not only in order to avoid the payment of 
debts due to him but also in order to seize documents he 
possessed, and prevent revelations." ^ Moreover, skil- 
ful detectives, Dossanville and Asvedo, had known for 
some time past that "powerful men had decided on the 
banker's death." ^ The Directors were so little acquainted 
with the reasons for this slaughter that Barras, giving 
a few details of the crime, told his colleagues that "the 
lady's maid who looked after the child you know had 

^Among others the Gazette Prangais of the 5th of Floreal, year 
IV (April 24th, 1796) ; the Publiciste philanthrope, and the Journal 
des Homines libres. The incident is related there in a few lines. 
See also Aulard's RSaction thermidorienne, Vol. II, p. 138, where a 
police report of the 3rd of Floreal is given. 

^Sitting of the 9th of Floreal (April 28th). Revue Ustorique. 
See note to p. 204. 

^Beviie historique, p. 79. 

^The same, p. 82. 

280 



AT RANDOM 

her head cut off." They decided, however, to let justice 
"follow its course," — which stopped short before the first 
enquiries ; in such sort that none of the documents of the 
legal enquiry conducted by the justice of the peace were 
published and the exact number and names of the victims 
were kept secret. 

As to ^^tJie child you know,'' he had left Vitry-sur-Seine 
perhaps several months before the massacre. There is 
nothing to show in the dialogue of the Directors that they 
concerned themselves about either him or the place where 
he was ; in their opinion he was evidently a person of 
little importance, and this indifference again shows that 
none of the governors believed in the royal individuality 
of the guest sheltered for some time past by the unfortu- 
nate chatelain of Vitry. 

To mention this tragic interlude in the place assigned 
for it chronologically we have had to turn away from 
Angrie where the Vicomtesse de Turpin was bringing up 
the child entrusted to her by the leaders of the royal 
army. We must admire the indulgent kindness of that 
noble woman who, despite difficulties of all sorts, occa- 
sioned by her delicate situation as conciliator between 
the belligerents, had undertaken the education of a little 
stranger so untractable. He was a child "with blue eyes, 
aquiline nose and fair hair, Avith a beautiful face and fine 
blood and slender waist." ^ Notwithstanding these ad- 
vantages, in consequence of what lack of reasoning did 
the Vicomtesse, taking so much care over this intruder 
and occupying herself with him with attentive solicitude, 
never perceive that he was not of the class of society 
to which he pretended to belong; how is it that the man- 
ners and language of the pupil did not reveal his common 
origin to his circumspect hostess.'^ Chance alone saw to 
that. On arriving at the headquarters of the army of 

^Depositions of Mathieu Hardoux, and of Michael Landais, gen- 
darme at Rouen. See Loids XVII by J. de Saint-Leger, pp. 294 
and 297. 

281 



THE DAUPHIN 

Anjou, the Chevalier du Vesins, who had recently dis- 
embarked from England, learnt that "one of his nephews" 
was living at the Chateau of Angrie. He protested that 
no individual of his name had remained on the Continent; 
the whole of the de Vesins family had emigrated and was 
living in London, whence he came. The remark was re- 
lated to the Vicomtesse de Turpin; but, far from being 
angry with the imposter and turning him out immediately, 
"she did not hurry to send him away" and did not even 
show him her discontent. It was only when the Republi- 
can troops approached Angrie that she judged it oppor- 
tune to remove him from the chateau. She entrusted the 
child to a servant named Simon, with instructions that 
he be taken back to his parents. 

It is a good distance from Angrie to Vesins to which 
Simon proceeded at random, — at least fifteen leagues, 
and the roads were difficult. Simon was astride a red horse, 
carrying the little boy behind. They crossed the Loire 
and on the first night slept at La Pommeraye. The next 
day they continued on their journey by way of Chemille. 
The little rogue persisted in upholding that his father 
was a lord and pointed out to Simon farms which he 
pretended belonged to him.^ But when they arrived at 
Vesins, the landlord of the Hotel du Rocher immediately 
recognised the youngster as Mathurin Bruneau, the son 
of the village cobbler who had been dead for several years 
and whose wife was also dead. As it was market day, 
Simon stood at the entrance to the inn and shouted out, 
after the manner of a stall-keeper at a fair: "Who 
would like to claim and recognise this little fellow?" 
Several curious folk gathered round and informed Simon 
that a sister of Mathurin was living at Vihiers, a small 
town two leagues away. Simon went there and found the 
woman, who immediately recognised the boy and embraced 
him heartily; but, as she was not rich and could not 

^Deposition of Rene Montauban, otherwise called Simon. Archives 
of the Clerk of the Court of Rouen. 

282 



AT RANDOM 

take charge of him, she begged Simon to take him back 
to the Chateau of Angrie. The Vicomtesse's servant made 
up his mind immediately to do so and returned with the 
child to Mme. de Turpin's. Out of charity she con- 
sented to take back the imposter, who as a result of this 
adventure brought back a name. He was now Mathurin 
Bruneau, the orphan son of a cobbler of Vesins/ and he 
remained at the chateau, no longer among the masters, 
but living with "the servants," until the day when Mme. 
de Turpin, obliged to flee to escape the invasion of the 
"Blues" and take refuge with her family in the woods, 
intrusted Mathurin to one of her keepers with whom, 
"mingled with the village children," he appeared to her 
to be in safety.^ 

The sojourn of the pseudo-son of the Baron de Vesins 
at the Chateau of Angrie lasted about a year. 

In the early decades of the year V, which corresponded 
to the beginning of October, 1796, a young boy was travel- 
ling alone on foot through the Department of the Manche. 
Stopping at village after village, he prettily asked for 
hospitality, which was never refused him, and thus made 
his way stage by stage towards Cherbourg, where, it 
is believed, he wished to embark. In order to excite the 
pity of the peasants "he gave himself out to be the de- 
scendant of a very distinguished family which, in conse- 
quence of the events of the Revolution, had fallen on evil 
days." ^ — "The features of his face were agreeable. He 
had long and naturally curly hair, an artless smile, a per- 
suasive tone of voice and, in addition, a great air of dig- 
nity and candour." Moreover, he expressed himself with 

^Declaration of Rene Montauban, otherwise called Simon. Archives 
of the Clerk of the Court of Rouen. 

^Most of the details of this episode were related by Mme. de 
Turpin when giving evidence later in a court of justice. Archives 
of the Clerk of the Court of Rouen. See Louis XVII, Charles de 
Navarre, by Mme. J. de Saint-Leger, pp. 269, 319, 320, 339, and other 
versions of the same incidents, pp. 280, 281, 282. 

^f/n. faux Dauphin dans le departement de la Marne. Jean Marie 
Hervagault d'apres des documents inedits — 1781-1812 by Gustave 
Laurent, Chalons-sur-Marne 1899. 

283 



THE DAUPHIN 

ease and appeared to have received some education, but, 
either because he was not endowed with the skill and pru- 
dence indispensable to every imposter, or else because he 
did not yet know how to play his part, his conduct be- 
gan to puzzle people, he was reported to the police, and, 
on his arrival at Cherbourg, was arrested. "A quantity of 
rich jewels'* were found upon him.^ The little vaga- 
bond's description was communicated to all the districts 
of the Department and thus it was discovered that the 
child was the son of a tailor of Saint-L6 named Rene 
Hervagault, to whom the judicial authorities handed him 
over without other penalty than a severe reprimand. 

Rene Hervagault was at that time forty years of age. 
Bom at Saint-James, in the diocese of Avranches, he 
had settled down at Saint-L6 after his marriage with a 
very pretty girl, Nicole Bigot,^ whom he had married, 

^Report of Citizen Chaix, commissioner of the Government to the 
tribunal of Reims, quoted by G. Laurent. 

^As one may imagine, this name of Bigot, which appears on the 
death certificate of the child of the Temple and which we come 
across again in the case of the family of the first of the "false 
Dauphins," has raised numerous hypotheses; the one most generally 
spread was that Hervagault pere had handed over, for a good sum 
of money, to royalist or other conspirators this son whom, for a 
very good reason, he did not like; that little Hervagault had re- 
placed the Dauphin in the Temple, whilst the young prince took 
his substitute's place in the Hervagault household; but that Nicole 
Bigot, not having consented to give up her son without someone 
near to her watching over him, had requested one of her relatives 
in Paris — Ren6 Bigot — not to lose sight of her child. Thus was 
explained the unjustified interference of the Rene Bigot, who ap- 
peared at the Temple for the first time in January, 1794. It was 
then that he brought his nephew to the prison to replace the Dauphin. 
We again meet Ren6 Bigot at the time of the death, when he de- 
clares himself the "friend of the deceased," he being placed there 
in order, later, to be able to attest that the child that had just died 
was little Hervagault buried under the name of the boy Capet. . . . 
These suppositions are ingenious, but careful examination obliges 
us to put them on one side. Nicole Bigot, the daughter of Andr6 
Bigot and the granddaughter of Claud Francois Bigot, all peasants 
of Colombier, Haute-Saone, do not appear to be in any way related 
to Rene Bigot, son of Pierre Florent Bigot, and grandson of Ren6 
Bigot, who were Parisians from father to son. She was certainly 
neither his sister, nor his niece, nor even his great niece, nor his 
cousin-german. The only point that appears to establish a very 
vague and distant connection between these two Bigot families lies 
in the Christian names of Pierre Florent, under which Rene's father 

284 



AT RANDOM 

it was said, more out of interest than love. Nicole Bigot 
was not a native of Normandy. Descended from peasants 
of Franche-Comte/ she had been brought, it was believed, 
to the Bessin by the young Due de Valentinois, son of the 
Seigneur de Torigny, who had known her at Versailles 
where she had been a lace-maker. According to tradi- 
tion long credited in the district, this nobleman, anxious 
to provide for his mistress, who was about to become a 
mother, had married her to one of the numerous de- 
pendents of Torigny, Rene Hervagault, who having 
served in the French guards under the nickname of La 
Jeunesse, scorned the prejudices common to backward 
peasants of his province. Appearances, moreover, were 
saved by his prompt consent. The marriage was cele- 
brated in Paris at the church of Saint Germain I'Auxer- 
rois on February 24th, 1781 ; the child was inscribed for 
baptism, at Saint L6, under the names of Jean Marie on 
September 20th of the same year, a minimum but suffi- 
cient delay at which no one had strictly the right to be 
scandalized; inasmuch as five other children followed in 
a few years, although the Due de Valentinois had long 
since ceased to take an interest in their mother. 

It was this little Jean Marie Hervagault who, in 1796, 
when fifteen years of age, deserted the parental roof. Did 
a taste for adventure induce him to undertake this es- 
capade? Did he note a marked preference on the part 
of Hervagault jpere for his other children? Can we sup- 
pose that, through an indiscretion, he had become ac- 
quainted with the rumours formerly' circulated on the sub- 
is designated and which are somewhat similar to those of one of 
Nicole's uncles, who was named Pierre Laurent. Moreover, to 
find there an indication of some relationship we should have to 
admit an error of wording, fairly frequent, it is true, in the eighteenth 
century, in the drawing up of the certificate. We also observe that 
Rene Hervagault's marriage with Nicole Bigot, neither of whom 
were inhabitants of Paris, took place at Saint Germain I'Auxerrois; 
and it was also in this parish that Rene Bigot was married three 
years before. But these coincidences, due purely to chance, per- 
haps, are not indications of relationship. 
^She was born at Colombier near Vesoul, on August 28th, 1757, 

^85 



THE DAUPHIN 

ject of his birth. There are many riddles at the beginning 
of his adventures, and although it has been claimed that 
their mystery has been penetrated, all, as we shall see, 
have not been solved. One must first of all point out that 
singular carelessness of the tailor Hervagault as regards 
the eldest of his children. Jean Marie was evidently looked 
after but little ; he was hardly happy in his father's house, 
since he departed from it so easily and so willingly. Hardly 
had the departmental gendarmerie brought him back to 
Saint-L6 than he escaped again, this time directing his 
steps towards Calvados, in the hope, perhaps, of reaching 
Trouville and Havre. He had obtained — where.'' — girl's 
clothes, but confided to every comer that he had adopted 
this disguise in order the better to put people off the 
track and facilitate his passage to England. At the 
Chateaux where he called he said he was the son of the 
Due d'Ursel, son-in-law of the King of Portugal; else- 
where he claimed that his father was the Prince of Monaco, 
which tends to prove that someone — perhaps the mother 
— had revealed to him the secret of his birth. -^ The sur- 
prising thing was his knowledge of the names and matri- 
monial unions of the highest nobility of France. Soon he 
left it be understood that ties of relationship united him 
to Louis XVI, Queen Marie Antoinette and Joseph II of 
Austria. . . . He received a hearty welcome every- 
where ; he was assisted, furnished with subsidies, and thus 
he reached Hotot, in the district of Ange. There he was 
arrested, taken before a Justice of the Peace, and sent 
to the prison of Bayeux, where Hervagault pere, informed 
of his incarceration came to claim him and bring him 
back to Saint-L6. This was in the spring of 1797.^ 

Although the magistrates advised the tailor to keep a 
sharp eye on his son, the latter had no liking at all for 
the narrow and monotonous life of the paternal house- 

^The Due de Valentinois, chdtelain of Torigny, was, as is known, 
the Prince of Monaco. 

-He was arrested on the 26th of Vent6se, year V (March 16th, 
1797). 

286 



AT RANDOM 

hold, and at the beginning of 1798 we find him again en 
route. He was wearing an old blue coat, ample trousers 
a la Jwngroise, and sabots. His intention, perhaps, was 
to get to the Vendee, for he first of all reached Laval; but 
the difficulty of entering those western regions, which were 
closely watched, made him decide to take the Alen9on 
road. On reaching that place, without resources, he 
knocked at the door of a lady named Talon de Lacombe, 
who lived alone in a property at Joncherets, at a dis- 
tance of half a league from the town. He introduced him- 
self under the name of Montmorency and said he was on 
his way to Dreux, where the Chateau of his family, dis- 
persed by the Revolution, stood. As he was exhausted 
with fatigue and without a crown in his pocket, Mme. de 
Lacombe overcome with pity, gave him shelter and in- 
vited him to remain with her until he had recovered his 
strength. She supplied him with linen, clothes, money 
and treated him as a distinguished guest. Jean Marie 
played his part with the most convincing ease and assur- 
ance. Every evening in the home of his generous hostess, 
surrounded by neighbouring chateau owners attracted by 
the presence of this heir of one of the most illustrious 
names in France, he related with touching minuteness of 
detail the misfortunes of his noble family. His manners 
were distinguished, his tone so sincere, his physiognomy 
so captivating, and he slipped so generously into the hand 
of the groom who saddled his horse or the servant who 
waited on him at table one of the louis d'or given him 
by the good lady, that nobody doubted his illustrious ori- 
gin. Mme. de Lacombe, seeing him re-established, expressed 
a desire to take him herself as far as the family chateau 
and hand him over to his parents. He raised no objec- 
tions and on reaching Dreux with his benefactress began 
to seek and make enquiries everywhere. But nobody could 
give him any information. They knew the name of Mont- 
morency only through a recollection of the Constable 
killed in 1562 at a famous battle, whereupon Mme. de 

287 



THE DAUPHIN 

Lacombe, realising that she had been duped, abandoned 
her protege and sadly retraced her steps to Alen9on, "re- 
gretting the loss of forty louis d'or which the alleged 
Montmorency had obtained through her too ready gen- 
erosity." ^ 

Hervagault continued his journey. He crossed Paris 
without being noticed, and in the first fortnight of May 
we find him at Meaux, penniless, for he was not a hoarder. 
Wandering through the streets of the town in search of a 
charitable soul he found it in the person of a trades- 
woman, Mere la Ravine, who was setting up her stall on 
the fair ground. The young vagabond's good looks, the 
pretty suit of striped nankeen which he owed to the gen- 
erosity of Mme. de Lacombe, and his air of discreet melan- 
choly interested the itinerant trader, to whom he related 
a fresh romance. With the four louis which she gave 
him in his pocket, he went immediately and reserved a 
seat in the Strasbourg mail coach which was to pass 
through Meaux in the evening. The next morning, May 
24th (the 5th of Prairial, year V), he arrived at the 
Chalons stage, had breakfast served him and got back into 
the coach with purse absolutely empty. 

After travelling for half an hour, he asked that the 
coach be stopped as he wished to get down. There was 
nothing unusual in such a request in those days of in- 
terminable journeys. Perotte, the driver of the coach, 
agreed to draw up, whereupon the young traveller stepped 
down and reached a neighbouring hedge, behind which he 
disappeared. Soon the postilions lost patience. Perotte 
called out but received no reply. The occupants of the 
coach had also got out and began to search among the 
bushes, commenting on the disappearance of the young 
boy, whose prettiness and modesty had charmed them. 
They called to him in all directions ; shouted that they 
could not wait any longer and that they would leave him 

^Histoire des deux famx Dauphins by Alphonse de Beauchamp, 
1818 p. 60. 

S88 



AT RANDOM 

there. . . . Absolute silence reigned. There was nothing 
else for them to do but to get back into their seats and 
start off again, and soon the coach disappeared in the 
direction of Vitry-le-Fran9ois, then called "Vitry-sur- 
Mame. 

When the vehicle was out of sight Hervagault left his 
hiding place and, wandering about the country, thus 
reached the Marne and directed his steps towards a ham- 
let standing at the foot of the slopes on one side of the 
river. The place was Mairy, at a distance of two leagues 
from Chalons. To the first peasant he met he declared 
that he was without shelter and was frightened to spend 
the night in the fields. The man examined him, was taken 
with his timid appearance, and agreed to lodge him if he 
would be content to share the bed of a young labourer. 
But Hervagault received this proposal with disgust and 
asked insolently "for whom he took him and if he had the 
air of living with valets?" The astonished villager 
thought the boy was insane and went and told his story 
to the Justice of the Peace of Cernon. The garde cham- 
petre was put on his track and the same evening the ad- 
venturer was arrested. As he refused to answer the ques- 
tions asked him, he was sent the next day to Chalons and 
imprisoned.^ 

At his first examination he assumed a mysterious tone, 
declaring that he was thirteen years of age but maintain- 
ing silence regarding his birthplace and the object of his 
journey. However, as the magistrate insisted on knowing 
at least his name, the child showed impatience and mut- 
tered : "you have sought enough. You'll learn it only too 
soon!" They had to be content with this vague declara- 
tion. The Minister of Police, informed of the incident, 
ordered the insertion "in the principal newspapers" " 

^We are here following H^relle, Alphonse de Beauchamp, and 
Gustave Laurent, whose narratives having been written in accordance 
with the judicial documents, differ but slightly. 

^Newspapers of Champagne or Paris? No trace has been found 
of this insertion, which G. Laurent places in June, 1798. 

289 



THE DAUPHIN 

of a notice that in the prison at Chalons was "a young 
boy who stated he was aged about thirteen and who did 
not appear to be older." The note continued to describe 
the prisoner's costume and to point out that "his conver- 
sation revealed more than an ordinary education." 
Nothing resulted, however, from this publication and the 
prisoner remained nameless. Here we have a first stum- 
bling block in this apparently fairly clear episode. The 
son of the tailor of Saint-L6, born in September, 1781, 
was approaching, in June, 1798, the end of his seventeenth 
year. Now, the Chalons adventurer did not appear to 
be more than thirteen and he was not therefore the son 
of the tailor Hervagault. We are surprised that the at- 
tention of none of his historians has been arrested by this 
difficulty. Is it not apparent that it compromises the 
probability of the whole narrative of adventurers? For 
if we can readily admit that a child inspires interest and 
reaps the benefit of his weakness, it is not the same in the 
case of a completely formed youth, perhaps already 
bearded, capable in any case of earning his living, and con- 
sequently we can explain neither the indulgence of the 
Bayeux magistrate, nor the passion of Mme. de Lacombe, 
nor the singular generosity of Mere Ravine, nor the def- 
erence of the commissioner of Chalons, nor so many other 
marks of attachment which the little wanderer received 
wherever he went. At the prison where he was he again 
inveigled everybody. Mme. Vallet, the wife of the door- 
keeper and her daughter Catherine, specially charged to 
look after him, — he was, then, indeed, a child — declared 
him "charming." A week had hardly elapsed since the 
beginning of his detention when there arrived a box, ad- 
dressed to the unknown boy by an anonymous sender, — a 
box containing choice eatables, a watch and "a magnificent 
silver service," which the captive was authorized to use, 
and which he received like a person long accustomed to 
the luxury of silver plate. He showed himself, moreover, 
to be very "refined." He required fine linens, could not 

290 



AT RANDOM 

bear to sleep for two nights running in the same sheets 
and as they could refuse him nothing those on his bed were 
changed every day. He ordered clothes from Hyacinthe, 
the tailor of the town and was obligingly supplied with 
them. At the apothecary Melchiors he had soon run up 
an account for two hundred francs for eaux de toilette. 
He had no money, but with a prodigality which seemed 
natural to him he did not spend any the less, and his 
jailor paid for him. In a few weeks this honest man 
had advanced for his prisoner 2400 livres, — delighted, 
moreover, to contribute to the well-being of this engaging 
boarder. Never before had such squandering been seen 
in a prison — unless it was at the Temple in August, 1792, 
when, destitute of everything, the royal family was in- 
stalled there. . . . 

Then this extraordinary thing happened. The pris- 
oner, asked to declare who his parents were, carelessly 
stated his name to be Louis Antoine Joseph Frederic de 
Longueville, the son of the late Marquis de Longueville, 
Lord of Beuzeville and other places ; and whilst the magis- 
trate was making in Normandy an enquiry which lasted 
for two months and was of course fruitless,^ a flash of 
light illuminated the minds of a few citizens of Chalons 
overwhelmed by the confession of the interesting prisoner 
who was the talk of the whole town. Louis was the name 
of the last King of France, Antoine recalled that of the 
poor Queen, Joseph evoked the recollection of the brother 
of Antoinette, Frederic was the name of the Philosopher- 
king. The child was assuredly of illustrious birth. Might 
he not be the son of Louis XVI, whose death had for- 
merly given rise to so many legends.'* From hypothesis 
they quickly passed to certainty. The mischievous prince 
claimed a Norman origin. This, without betraying the 
secret of his august rank, was an allusion to the title of 

^Despatches of the 24th, 25th, and 29th of Fructidor and of the 
2nd supplementary day of the year VI. Vitry files. Quoted by 
G. Laurent. 

291 



THE DAUPHIN 

"Duke of Normandy," which he had borne in his early 
years. People discussed, became excited, grew heated. 
Mystery and adventure exercise a powerful charm over 
all minds ! They went to the prison to study the features 
of young Longuevillc ; examined his gait and gestures ; 
and came to the conclusion that he was certainly a Bour- 
bon. That is how, through the conviction of a few "be- 
hind the scenes," Pere Vallet's boarder was promoted to 
the rank of King of France, and how the rumour spread 
in Chalons. 

"De Joas conserve retonnante merveille." ^ 

But Joas persisted in keeping silent. He did not pre- 
tend to be the Dauphin, but he did not undeceive any of 
those who attributed that personality to him. The "ini- 
tiates," as his partisans called themselves, dispensed with 
his confession and surrounded him with attentions and 
homage. A leading tradeswoman, Mme. Saignes,^ of a 
romantic turn of mind, despite her more than ordinary 
corpulence, her red hair, little eyes and big nose, ap- 
pointed herself his chamberlain and major-domo. She 
transformed the "prince's" cell into a "little palace," 
furnished with her finest furniture and hung with tapes- 
tries. She acted as his governess and even servant. It 
was she who persuaded the doorkeeper to release the pris- 
oner, who, dressed as a girl and charming in that borrowed 
costume, went for walks with Catherine Vallet under the 
quincunxes of the Jard. It was also Mme. Saignes who, 
in ambiguous words, spread the astonishing history among 
all her customers and recruited a court of faithful sub- 
jects for the anonymous king. Among the most assidu- 
ous were a lady named Felix, M. and Mme. Jacobe de 
Rambecourt, M. Adnet, a notary. Mile. Jacobe de 

^See Racine's Athalie. Joas, a royal child saved by a miracle 
from a cruel death and brought up secretly in the Temple by the 
high priest Joad. — Translator's note. 

^Pierette^ulie, divorced wife of Pierre Joseph Saignes, hair- 
dresser. Mme. Saignes, who, in 1798, was 48 years of age, was 
established at Chalons as a furniture dealer and upholsterer. 

292 



AT RANDOM 

Vienne and Jacobe de Pringy, M. de Torcj, M. Jacquier- 
Lemoine and also a former bodyguard of Louis XVI, 
M. de Beurnonville. When the conversation of these 
courtiers deviated towards the tragic past and revolu- 
tionary catastrophes, large tears which he had difficulty 
in witliliolding were seen to form in the child's beautiful 
eyes. On the advent of the fete des Morts he distributed 
alms, asking for prayers "for his father who had died 
on the scaffold of the Terror" and when, on a certain day 
a blunderer took it into his head to recall in his presence 
the punishment meted out to Marie Antoinette he made 
a gesture of despair, burst into tears and fled into the 
next room. 

The magistrates of Chalons were in a terrible dilemma. 
Dondeau, the Minister of Police, worried them inces- 
santly. "I should have thought," he wrote, "that with 
a little attention, it ought not to have been difficult to 
make a young boy, little familiar with dissimulation of 
judicial forms, speak." ^ To finish with the matter he 
demanded the child's "exact age" and his exact descrip- 
tion,^ and a few weeks later he triumphantly announced 
that the mystery was unveiled. Thanks to the particu- 
lars communicated, he had discovered, the father of the 
prisoner of Chalons, — namely, a poor tailor of Saint-L6 
named Hervagault, who declared that he was ready to 
take back his son if only the gendarmerie would undertake 
to hand him on from brigade to brigade as far as Caen» 

We should scruple to complicate an imbroglio in it- 
self sufficiently troubling; but we cannot help asking 
ourselves how it was that Pere Hervagault, on learning 
that a child of thirteen and a half years, dressed in a 
nankeen suit, had been arrested at Chalons, was able 
to guess that it was his son, then in his eighteenth year^ 

'Letter of the 27th of Vendeniare, year VII. Quoted by <c. 
Laurent. 

^The 31st of Brumaire, year VII. Journal de la Manche of the 
19th of Sept., 1906: Un aventurier saint-lois by Leon Gosset. Writ- 
ten in accordance with documents of the case and local narratives. 

293 



THE DAUPHIN 

and who had left Saint-L6 enveloped in an old blue great- 
coat. Nor can we discern by what method the Minister — 
unless he was endowed with double sight, which was cer- 
tainly not so in the case of Dondeau — came to address 
himself precisely to Saint-L6 in order to decide on the 
identity of a child imprisoned in the Marne. Had he then 
made enquiries at all the Police Commissaries in France? 
— or else had Pere Hervagault, on his part, undertaken 
some researches which attracted the attention of the 
authorities? No, most certainly not, otherwise we should 
find trace of them either in the local archives or in those 
of the Ministry. The intervention of the Saint-L6 tailor 
appeared at first so ill-founded that the Minister put 
the magistrate of Chalons on his guard against a probable 
collusion.^ Meanwhile, an order was given to take care 
that the prisoner was "closely watched." 

Now, no complaint had been laid against him. He had 
wronged nobody. His purveyors refused to b€ paid. The 
apothecary Melchior benevolently abandoned the sums 
due to him, "because," he said, "this young man has a 
good character." Hyacinthe, who had supplied his 
clothes, and Mme. Saignes, who had furnished his cell, 
declared that they could not recollect the amount of their 
expenses ; whilst the doorkeeper, Vallet, would not claim 
a decime of the 2400 livres he had advanced, declaring 
that he would always retain "great friendship" ^ for his 
prisoner. Vallet was dismissed and lost his situation on 
account of this fine action, certainly unique in penitential 
annals. As to the others, on learning that "their prince" 
was the son of a little Norman tailor, after a brief period 
of fright, they felt their faith in his royal origin redouble. 
It was perfectly clear to them that the Dauphin, having 
escaped from the Temple, had been replaced in his prison 

*"The claim of the tailor Hervagault," wrote the Minister, "does 
not offer a sujBBcient guarantee to consider the prisoner as his son. 
It is necessary for this alleged father to justify in the best manner, 
both by documents and by witnesses, the individual he claims is his 
son." Vitry file, quoted by G. Laurent. 

^Journal de la Manche, loc. cit. Article by M. Leon Gosset. 

294j 



AT RANDOM 

by another child whose personahty the son of Louis XVI 
must have adopted, Hervagault, be it so. In future they 
would not name "the prince" otherwise and this incarna- 
tion, humiliating though it might be, would surely protect 
him against the dangers which threatened the descendants 
of kings. And all the "initiates" agreed in considering 
the apathy of the tailor of Saint-L6, who for six to seven 
months had resigned himself so easily to his son's dis- 
appearance, as surprising. Astonishment — and convic- 
tion increased when it was learned that the letters ad- 
dressed by this heedless father to his child who at last 
had been found were written "in an almost respectful 
tone." ^ However, this intervention satisfied the judicial 
authorities. The prisoner, confessing that he was the son 
of the tailor, nothing more remained to be done than to 
obtain the father's formal recognition. The Correctional 
Tribunal decided on the 13th of Pluviose, year VII (Feb. 
1st, 1799) to postpone judgment until the day when "the 
individuality" of the prisoner was sufficiently established 
and Jean Marie Hervagault was handed over to the gen- 
darmes to be taken to Saint-L6. On the day of his de- 
parture he was to be seen consoling his faithful supporters 
who, in tears, had gathered in front of the prison door. 
He set off abundantly provided with money. It was 
learnt that at the first halting place he treated the escort 
royally and, "judging from the welcome he received all 
along the road, one would have thought that his arrival 
at all the places he passed had been announced." " Two 
months later he reappeared at Chalons. Pere Herva- 
gault having signed the declaration of recognition with 
docility, and the Tribunal of the Marne condemned Jean 
Marie to one month's imprisonment. 

At the expiration of his sentence he was again di- 
rected towards the chief town of the Manche. But he did 
not get as far as that, for at Guiberville, not far from 

^G. Laurent, p. 30. 
'The same, p. 36. 

295 



THE DAUPHIN 

Torigny, he was arrested on a charge of again attempting 
to swindle and taken to Vire, where, — tried without in- 
cident, but with severity, he was condemned to two years' 
imprisonment. Regarding this new and long imprison- 
ment we have little information, at least if we keep to 
authentic documents. From certain and rather suspi- 
cious testimony, it would appear that the Marquise de 
Tourzel, informed of the sojourn at Vire of the false 
Dauphin, took an interest in him and, curious to know 
him if not personally nor even in effigy, but according to 
a precise description, asked for this description.^ Allu- 
sion has even been made to letters sent by the former 
governess of the children of the King of France to the 
young prisoner of Vire and to his replies in which he gave 
a favourable account of the progress of his literary edu- 
cation. This is negligible gossip. More authentic are 
the relations kept up between Hervagault (the name by 
which we will henceforth call him) and his followers of 
Chalons. Mme. Saignes, especially, signalised herself by 
her ardent zeal, striving to "moderate the severity of 
imprisonment by the amenity of her correspondence.'* 
All the gifts collected for the unfortunate "Dauphin" 
were transmitted by her "religiously," ^ and when, in the 
summer of 1801, the day of liberation approached Mme. 

^The following is the text of this description as reproduced in 
Gruan de la Barre's Les intrigues devoilees, Vol. I, p. 536, and in 
which everything bids us to accept it only under reserve: "Descrip- 
tion of Louis Charles of France (?) set down in the prison of 
Vire, September 10th, 1800: age about fifteen; height about five 
feet; light chestnut hair, large, well formed and well marked eye- 
brows, darker than the hair; prominent, bright and very beautiful 
eyes; well formed nose, average forehead and mouth; small dimpled 
chin; a mole at the corner of the right ear ... a scar under the 
right eyebrow caused by the operation performed on M. Louis at 
the prison of Chalons (?), another small scar between the nose and 
upper lip; on the middle of the right leg, in the small part of the 
calf, on the right side, a shield-like impression bearing in the middle 
three fteurs de lys above the royal crown and around them the initial 
letters of the Christian names of M. Louis, his father, his mother 
and his aunt Elizabeth. In addition, face slightly marked with 
smallpox." At the bottom of this document were the words "For 
Mme. de Tourzel." 

"Alphonse de Beauchamp, p, 67. 

296 



AT RANDOM 

Saignes, in order that the poor child should avoid finding 
himself again exposed without assistance to the hazards 
and risks of a life of adventure, secretly took the road to 
Vire to receive her prince at the very door of the prison. 
Another "initiate" of Chalons, Citizen Peudefer, offered to 
assist her in this honourable mission; but in order not to 
awaken suspicion, he reached the capital of the Normandy 
Socage by another road. At last Hervagault was in 
their arms. They carried him off, comforting him and 
assuring him of the fidelity of his friends of the Marne. 
Five days later he reached Chalons with his bodyguard. 
It was thought prudent not to enter the town during the 
day, so they waited until nightfall to reach Mme. Saignes' 
house where a reception had been prepared. Acclama- 
tions, homage, the kissing of hands and revelry fol- 
lowed. The triumphant Mme. Saignes overflowed with 
joy and incessantly repeated: "Ah! I told you it was 
the— There he is !" 

The — meant "the King of France," but it was agreed 
the words should never be uttered. It was necessary 
to act with great prudence in order not to awaken the 
sleepy suspicions of the authorities and especially the 
animosity of the ex-member of the convention and regi- 
cide Batelier, who had become Commissioner of the Di- 
rectory to the Tribunal of Vitry and remained an ardent 
champion of the revolutionary idea.^ Once in posses- 
sion of the "desired object," Hervagault's trusty follow- 
ers sought a comfortable place of refuge at the house of 
some personage sufficiently important to be able, through 
his position, to protect him against the annoyances of the 

^See a complaint of the General Council of the Commune of Vitry 
against Batelier. Moniteiir. Reprint, Vol. XXV, p. 370. It looks 
as though certain peculiarities of the Hervagault affair had their 
origin in "parish squabbles," and a close study of the antagonism 
between the Royalist society of Vitry and the ex-member of the 
Convention would perhaps explain the ardour shown in defending 
and attacking the pseudo-Dauphin. It is to be noticed that, under 
the empire, Batelier remained on duty. He appears in the Al- 
manach de I'an XIII as Imperial Attorney General to the Tribunal 
of Vitry. 

297 



THE DAUPHIN 

police. M. Jacobe de Rambecourt, a wealthy landowner 
at Vitry, asked for the honour to receive him — thus pro- 
curing the satisfaction of setting at defiance the Jacobin 
Batelier in his own jurisdiction. Allied to the noble fam- 
ilies of the Perthois, M. de Rambecourt, a former equerry 
and lord of Clauseret, had been a member, in 1789, of 
the assembly of the nobility, at the time of the convoca- 
tion of the States General. At Vitry he possessed a 
large mansion, where the young King could worthily wait 
for his approaching enthronement. M. de Rambecourt, 
accompanied by a lady called Michel, esteemed at Vitry 
for her Royalist feelings, went to Chalons to fetch "the 
French Telemachus" (one can have no idea of the number 
of metaphors under which the prince's incognito was hid- 
den), and bring him back to Vitry, where an apartment in 
the Rambecourt mansion had been got ready for him. 

Hervagault was entertained there "with as much profu- 
sion as elegance," and his sudden adaptation to this cere- 
monial, to which for some time past he had appeared to 
be accustomed, still further strengthened the faith of his 
followers, who, however, had no need of this additional 
proof. The Court was composed, in addition to M. and 
Mme. Jacobe de Rambecourt, of M. and Mile. Peudefer, 
the ladies Saignes and Felix of Chalons, M. de Torcy, son 
of the deputy of the Marne on the Council of the Five 
Hundred, and the other supporters already mentioned. 
On the 6th of Fructidor, year IX, on the eve of the anni- 
versary of Saint-Louis, the King's fete was celebrated 
at Pringy at Mme. Jacobe's. Hervagault was presented 
with a magnificent bouquet, which he deigned to accept 
amidst cries of joy and gratitude from the whole weep- 
ing assembly. According to the testimony of M. de 
Beurnonville, the ex-guardsman, it was at this meeting 
that, solicited by his partisans, His Majesty consented, 
to prove his royal identity. One of them, having lived in 
Rome at the time of the emigration, had heard it related 
that the Dauphin, after his escape from the Temple, was 

298 



AT RANDOM 

taken to the Eternal City, where the Holy Father Pius 
VI, in order to be able to find him again in case of fresh 
adventures, "placed upon his leg, in the presence of 
twenty cardinals, a mark by means of which the son of 
the King of France might in the future distinguish him- 
self from eventual imposters," — a strange method of recog- 
nition and a very improbable episode which we find, with- 
out being able to know the reason, in the narrative of 
the majority of the false Louis XVIIths. Hervagault 
listened to the anecdote with a smile on his lips and, as 
they implored him to put their unanimous anguish to an 
end, he kindly consented to undo the buckle of his right 
garter, pull down his silk stocking and show the imprint 
of the shield of France which he bore "below the articula- 
tion of the right knee." ^ Although this was not "a 
proof," for, if he were a circumspect deceiver, Hervagault 
had had ample time to tattoo himself during his imprison- 
ment at Vire. The "initiates" declared it was marvellous 
and contemplated with rapture "that holy mark placed by 
the infallible hand of the Vicar of God!" It is extra- 
ordinary how blind and hostile to all criticism convictions 
are when based on sentiment, and this was clearly seen on 
the day when the Dauphin of Vitry consented to relate 
his eventful life from the day of his incarceration in the 
Temple until his arrival on the banks of the Marne. It 
was at a soiree at the house of the notary Adnet, a friend 
of M. Claude Jacquier, whose house, "one of the most 
sumptuous residences of Vitry, situated in the Rue Pavee, 
Hervagault occupied after his return from Prigny. He 
was treated there with the etiquette of Versailles, impor- 
tant personalities of the town counting themselves fortu- 
nate in being able to render him "the humblest services," 
which he accepted without either haughtiness or disdain 
but with complacent dignity. Now, as the notary, at 
the request of his numerous guests had taken the liberty 
of imploring Monseigneur to relate his departure from 

^Gazette des Tribunaux, September, 1847. See the description, p. 
296, note. 

299 



THE DAUPHIN 

the Temple and what happened to him afterwards, the 
supposed Dauphin launched into a narrative, "invented 
with art," which, it must be hoped, has not been handed 
down to us textually, otherwise we should be justified in 
judging the audacious bragging of the narrator as 
severely as the ignorant patience of his audience.^ There 
is mention in it of Simon and his wife, "debased with 
blood and wine, and whose disgusting mouth uttered 
nothing but obscenities" ; of a devoted nurse who attended 
the young prince at the Temple itself, of daily interviews 
with his sister, "when they reunited to him at meal and 
play times." Not a word, on the other hand, about the 
six months' isolation which elapsed between Simon's de- 
parture and the 9th of Thermidor. We hear of an un- 
known man "dressed as a sailor" and of M. de Frotte 
"armed to the teeth" carrying off the child in a washer- 
woman's basket, the arrival at Charette's camp, then a 
sojourn with the King of England, the journey to Rome, 
the extravagant welcome of the Pope, who impressed his 
indelible mark on the knee of the young prince, who, hence- 
forth certain not to lose himself, went to the Court of 
Spain and was engaged (he was eleven years of age!) 
to a widow Princess Benedictine, the Queen's sister. Nine 
sovereign princes, whose ambassadors hastened to Lisbon, 
recognised him King of France and formed a league on 
behalf of his cause. Then came a journey to Berlin and 
the return to France, whither the son of Louis XVI was 
summoned by the Clichy Committee. Surprised by the 
coup d'etat of the 18th of Fructidor (and still dressed 
in feminine apparel!) he wandered from town to town as 
far as Cherbourg. . . . We know the remainder. And 
this scenario of a newspaper serial, in which everything 
is higgledy-piggledy, — chronology, historical events and 
even probability, was set forth in fine language, sprinkled 
with grandiloquent phrases dear to the style of the period, 

^This narrative is reproduced by Beauchamp. Histoire de deux 
faux Dauphins, pp. 75 and following. 

300 



AT RANDOM 

such as "Ah ! delightful banks of the Tagus on which 
the seven hills arise ! . . . Magnificent palace of the 
Quelus ! It was within thy walls that I first knew love ! 
Heaven, what happy recollections flock to my inflamed 
imagination! Ah, too modest Benedictine!" . . . No, 
it is impossible that, having submitted to this piece of 
eloquence, the "initiates" of Vitry felt themselves "a prey, 
no longer merely to enthusiasm but to fanaticism," and 
declared that he was indeed Charles Louis de Bourbon, 
son of Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette of Austria. Her- 
vagault had, up to then, given too great a proof of skill 
and tact to have compromised by a rhapsody of that kind 
the position he had acquired. 

It is curious to point out that, in the case of all those 
who gave themselves out to be "escaped Dauphins,"^ — 
and there were a great number of them, no fewer than 
thirty, — the stumbling block was always the recital of 
the circumstances of their abduction and the peripetias 
which followed. Concerning those important events, not 
one of them was able to supply a version which agreed 
even approximately with what history tells us. The part, 
at least at the outset, was, however, easy to play, since 
it sufficed to say: "I do not know." Hervagault, who 
appeared on the stage before all the others, had only to 
maintain silence to receive applause; his audience fur- 
nished him with his replies in profusion; consequently it 
is probable that the speech summarised above was never 
delivered. At the time Hervagault was living in Cham- 
pagne there was published in Paris a novel — without value, 
moreover — entitled Le cimetiere de la Madeleine, by 
Regnault-Warin, to which the false Louis XVIIths of 
the future were imprudently to go for their documenta- 
tion, for the theme of the story was the escape of the 
son of Louis XVI, then a new but dangerous subject, as 
the printer of the work found when he saw his forms broken 
up by the police of the Consulate and when he heard the 
doors of the Temple prison close upon him and the author, 

30,1 



THE DAUPHIN 

that prison which the latter had thus an opportunity of 
visiting, which he had never done before, although he 
speaks a good deal about it in the incriminated publica- 
tion.^ The book must have aroused considerable curi- 
osity, since, in proportion as the clandestine editions were 
seized, its vogue increased.^ Did a copy reach Vitry? 
Did Hervagault have an opportunity to read it? That 
is possible. But he would have committed a great error 
in borrowing from this purely imaginary work, which 
contemporaries appear to have accepted as the most 
authentic of histories. Hervagault, in fact, possessed 
over his successors the undoubted advantage of having 
been the one they tried to copy but who imitated nobody. 
His youthfulness, physical appearance, roguishness, heed- 
lessness and even reticence brought him more partisans 
than long speeches would have done. Moreover, so little 
acquainted with the events of the Revolution as the gen- 
erality of French people then were, these Royalists of 
Champagne, by harbouring the Pretender, knew they were 
risking if not the scaffold at least deportation. They 
must have had, to believe in the illustrious origin of their 
feted guest, other motives than the tattooing of the royal 
knee or the love for the "too modest Benedictine." The 
Pretender, on his part, possessed other and more con- 
vincing arguments: the strange conduct of his pretended 
father, the tailor of Saint L6, who, as though he had been 
forced to it, had come to Cherbourg to fetch him at the 
time of his first escapade ; who had never thought of going 
to Vire to take him back after his two years' imprison- 
ment; who took no further interest in his lot and kept 
quiet, since the authorities no longer required him to 
take action. He was able, above all, to argue from his 
age — sixteen years in 1801, instead of twenty, which the 
true Hervagault would have been, and nobody on that 

^See at the beginning of the third volume of his Cimetihre de la 
Madeleine a preface in which the author relates his quarrels with 
the Consular police. 

-See Tourneux, Bibliographie, Vol. Ill, No. 12437. 

302 



AT RANDOM 

point would have contradicted him, for, in that summer 
at Vitry, his physiognomy was still so "childish" that, 
when the young* boy walked through the streets of the 
town, escorted by M. Jacobe de Rambecourt, respectful 
and full of attention towards his pleasing companion, the 
passers-by took him to be a "young lady disguised," and 
the reputation of the austere nobleman even somewhat 
suffered. 



There now came on the scene an unexpected personage : 
Citizen Charles Lafont-Savine, ex-bishop of Viviers. De- 
scended from a family of the old nobility, he had been 
brought up by his mother, a Castellane, "an ardent, witty 
and frivolous woman," who recommended the reading of 
Emile and the Contrat social to this favourite child, who 
was intended, however, for the Church.^ First of all 
Vicar-general of the bishopric of Mende and then at Laon, 
Lafont de Savine had, at thirty-six years of age, in 1778, 
been consecrated bishop of Viviers. He united to his ex- 
tensive knowledge an astonishing memory, a gift for 
languages and eloquence, and a very clear mind "when he 
did not devote his attention to the objects of his successive 
infatuations."^ 

His episcopal palace, situated on the bank of the Rhone, 
was one of the finest in France. He had populated its 
gardens with nightingales and golden-crested wrens; his 
pack of hounds was renowned; his worldly magnificence 
rivalled that of the Rohans and the Dillons. Was it in 
order not to leave this comfortable existence that, elected 
in 1789 deputy to the States General, Mgr. de Savine re- 
signed after ten days,^ and that, later, he was one of the 

^Simon Brugal Le schisme constitutionnel dans I'Ardbche. Lafont 
de Savine. 

'Biographie modeme ou Galerie historique civile, militaire . . . 
1816, 

^Moniteur. Introduction. Reprint, Vol. XXXII, p. 613. 

303 



THE DAUPHIN 

four French prelates who submitted to the Civil Constitu- 
tion of the clergy? He took the oath in his chair at the 
Cathedral and consequently maintained in his diocese, car- 
ried out both the duties of constitutional bishop and those 
of the Administrator of the Department. It was then 
that he began to show eccentricities. Taking off his cas- 
sock for the uniform of a National Guard, organising 
patriotic balls in his palaces and permitting his priests to 
marry, he at the same time, one must admit, used the in- 
fluence of his popularity to shield numerous unsworn ec- 
clesiastics from demagogic wrath. He gave full rein to 
his humanitarian reveries. On account of his incoherent 
genius, he was nicknamed "the Jean Jacques of the 
Clergy." His charity and philanthropy never abated, 
but this did not prevent him, after Thermidor, being 
brought before the Revolutionary Tribunal ^ which acquit- 
ted and conferred upon him a satisfecit. But, having ab- 
dicated his dignity and being without resources, he settled 
down in Paris and obtained a post at the Arsenal Library. 
This ex-bishop of the Ardeche was living, then, among 
books and learned men,^ satisfied with his lot. But, in 
spite of his downfall, he had remained a nobleman and a 
good Frenchman. The thought that this little Duke of 
Normandy, whom he had seen at Court and whose birth 

^Tribunal rcvolutionnaire. Sitting of the 21st of Vendemiaire, 
year III (October 12, 1794) "Charles Lafont-Savine . . . appointed 
administrator of the Department, Bishop since 1778, was the first 
founder of patriotic societies; did his best to propagate the republic 
spirit; only left his bishopric in consequence of a decree of the Na- 
tional Convention and when requested to do so." National Archives, 
Y. 466, No. 235. Wallon. Journal du Tribunal revolutionnaire, 
Vol. VI, p. 208. 

^The amount of the librarian's salary was very irregular. From 
Ventose to Prairial, year III, Savine received 150 livres a month, 
in Messidor and Thermidor 300 livres and in Fructidor 833 livres; 
in Germinal, year IV, he "touched" 1500 livres for the first fort- 
night and 84 livres 13 sous for the second. The figures increasing 
or diminishing according to whether payment was made in cash or 
in assignats. Savine's salary from Prairial, year IV, became regu- 
larly 88 livres 6 sous and 8 deniers. Information supplied by M. 
Henri Martin, curator of the Arsenal Library. 

304 



AT RANDOM 

had formerly inspired him to an eloquent mandate ^ had 
died in isolation, worn out at ten years of age by want 
and lack of care troubled the misled prelate to such an ex- 
tent that his conscience was haunted by a sort of remorse. 
Into his heart, liberated from the past, the King entered 
before God. Either because Savine refused to believe that 
wretched end possible or because his perspicacity told 
him that the precautions taken to publish whilst hiding it 
were suspicious, he undertook a personal enquiry, and, 
thanks to the connections which his diversified life had 
not failed to create for him in all classes of society, he 
succeeded in questioning the surgeons whom the Com- 
mittee of General Safety had ordered to perform the 
autopsy on the prisoner of the Temple. They did not 
hide from him "that they had indeed opened the body 
of a child but had not recognised that child to be the son 
of the former King Louis XVI." 

Evidently he did not content himself with that single 
detail and must have collected other information, for his 
conviction was absolute when, in the autumn of 1789, he 
learnt (perhaps through the notice inserted in the news- 
papers by order of the minister) that the Chalons 
prisoner detained was a child whose age — thirteen years — 
corresponded with the date of the prince's birth and whose 
description agreed with the portrait and descriptions of 
the young King. Savine immediately resigned his post as 
librarian ^ and hastened to Chalons, where, on calling 
upon the prisoner, he immediately and without hesitation 
recognised him as the surviving Dauphin. Savine no 
longer appeared on the books of the Arsenal Library after 
the end of Nivose, year V. There and then he appointed 
himself as Hervagault's councillor. It was due to him 
alone, it seems, that the "initiates" of Chalons came to 
understand that the prince was unable, without exposing 

*Abbe Sicard. L'ancien clergi de France, Vol. I, p. 222. 
^National Archives, F', 6312. Examination of Lafont-Savine. 
^Abb6 Sicard, loc. cit. 

305 



THE DAUPHIN 

himself to fresh tortures, to claim his august name; that 
of Hervagault, to which a still confused intrigue bound 
him, would serve him as a protection against man's 
malignity: if he rejected it, it would mean a State prison, 
secrecy, poison . . . and Savine repeated to his dear 
prince "Monseigneur, you are Hervagault, or you will 
die !" The ex-bishop did not limit his good offices to that 
piece of advice: it was he who proposed to undertake the 
prisoner's education, to prepare him for ascending the 
throne some day ; he would be his professor and guide ; he 
would give him lessons in Latin, literature, history and, 
for the first time since his abjuration, he proposed to open 
a catechism, an orthodox catechism^ in order that Simon's 
former pupil, who had forgotten his prayers, might be 
educated in the faith of his ancestors. There is not 
doubtless in French history a fact more revelatory of the 
formidable moral disorders of the social confusion occa- 
sioned by the Revolution that this almost unknown episode 
of a lost child being welcomed as a king by a few provin- 
cials, fashioned for the "duties of the crown" by a no- 
torious democrat, and instructed in the religion of his 
predecessors, those most Christian monarchs, by an ex- 
communicated renegade. 



After reappearing at his library^ for six months, 
Savine, in 1801, returned to Hervagault at Vitry and pre- 
pared him for his first communion. He obtained for him 
various works on the Revolution,^ prepared a programme 
of studies and resumed the Latin lessons. It is astonish- 
ing to see this prelate, who had formerly known the Court 
and its staff, conversing about things of the past with a 

*Abb6 Sicard, loc. cit. 

^From Prairial, year IX, to Ventose, year X, Savine, who lived 
"in the first courtyard of the Arsenal," was employed in sorting the 
books from the literary depositories of the Cordeliers and of Louis- 
la-Culture. Information communicated by M. Henri Martin, Curator 
of the Arsenal Library. 

^Alphonse de Beauchamp. 

306 



AT RANDOM 

youth whom he thought was the son of Louis XVI and 
still be undeceived after those reiterated exchanges of 
common recollections. On the contrary, his faith in the 
prince's personality increased daily. The Abbe Barret, 
"the chaplain" and consequently the confessor of the 
pseudo-prince, was also one of his most enthusiastic par- 
tisans, and we haA^e here a disturbing fact which has not 
escaped the notice of Hervagault's historians. Even 
those who never admitted the possibility of his Royal 
origin, struck by this epidemic of credulity, came to ask 
themselves whether this child "had not overheard some 
disclosure, some secret unknown to all ; if he had not been 
mixed up, as a supernumerary, in one or other of the in- 
trigues of the Temple." One cannot see, in fact, who 
could have taught the lesson to the son of the tailor of 
St. L6 and instructed him, even summarily, in the pe- 
culiarities of the life of Versailles, the Tuileries and the 
prison, to the extent of being able to deceive a prelate 
and nobleman who was, perhaps, a wild enthusiast but not 
a fool and in no way naif. Nothing in Mgr. Lafont de 
Savine's correspondence denotes mental derangement. 
Certain letters are even remarkable when one remembers 
that their author had touched the bottom of the revolu- 
tionary rabble and received the confidences of the worst 
demagogues. When putting Hervagault*s friends on 
guard against the dangers which threatened him, he made 
allusion, in prudent and almost terrified terms, to some 
international sect, "a power superior to all others," he 
wrote, "and which governs Europe to-day, a power from 
which the Dauphin would not escape if ever he appeared 
to resume his flight towards his first destiny. I even fear 
that this terrible power, which has eyes and arms every- 
where, possesses spies in its pay who watch over this child 
and allow him to live only on the condition that he is lost 
in nothingness and disdain."^ Notwithstanding this good 

^National Archives, F' 6523, quoted by J. de Saint-Ldger. Louis 
XVII dit Charles de Navarre. 

307 



THE DAUPHIN 

advice to be discreet, Hervagault's extraordinary adven- 
ture was noised abroad throughout the whole district and 
still further, since the news of the survival of the 
mysterious child reached Madame Royale, who was in 
Vienna, and Louis XVIII, then at Mittau. The latter 
declared, on this subject, that "if, against aU probability 
the statement were true, the person who was most in- 
terested in it — that is himself — would experience sincere 
joy and believe that he had found his son again."^ One 
can understand, then, that the ex-member of the Conven- 
tion Batelier, Governmental Commissioner to the Tribunal 
of Vitry-sur-Marne, was aware of everything that hap- 
pened at the house of M. Jacquier Lemoine and at the 
Rambecourts'. He informed Fouche, then Minister of 
Police, and in reply received a warrant for the arrest of 
the Pretender. On September 16th, 1801, a gala supper 
gathered the "initiates" aroimd their prince and at the 
very moment they were about to sit down to table there 
entered the room Commissary of Police Drouart, ac- 
companied by Bonjour, a non-commissioned officer com- 
manding a detachment of the gendarmerie. Great was the 
commotion. Those present surrounded Hervagault, who 
alone kept a good countenance. Understanding that he 
was going to sleep In prison, he ordered his host in an Im- 
perious tone *'to go into his room and fetch his coat," and 
the astonishment of the commissary equaled that of the 
gendarme when he saw that honoured landowner hasten to 
execute the order of the "scamp," bring back the garment 
and humbly assist his guest to put it on. Their fright 
increased when the accused, catching sight of the Cure 
Barret said to him, "Abbe, go and fetch my spectacles 

*See an article by N. Ernest Daudet in the Figaro of August 9, 
1904. The correspondence between Madame Royale and her uncle 
shows that nuns had, in 1798, informed Pere de Lestrange, Abbot of 
La Trappe, that a pretended Dauphin was going about. The abbot 
transmitted this information to the Princess, who wrote about it to 
Louis XVIII, from whom she did not hide her opinion that the 
story was an idle fancy which, she added, "according to everything 
I know thereon is irj no way probable." 

308 



AT RANDOM 

which are on the table de nuit," whereupon the venerable 
priest obeyed and, weeping and bowing almost to the 
ground, presented the glasses. At that moment the 
notary Adnet arrived. He had just learnt of what was 
happening and was so moved that he drew near with open 
arms ready to embrace the prince. But the latter dis- 
dainfully held out his hand, on which the other bestowed a 
respectful kiss. All the guests — the richest and most 
highly placed in the society of Vitry — then left the house 
as the accused was led away by the gendarme. They fol- 
lowed him as far as the prison and behind them, through 
the town in an uproar, came the servants carrying the 
dishes and the wines of the supper which was to continue 
in the jail until far into the night.* 

This prelude set the tone of that imprisonment before 
trial. Every day there was hand kissing and four ample 
meals served in costly dishes by servants of the Jacquier 
household. During hours at which "the Court" was not 
assembled, the prisoner was never alone, his faithful fol- 
lowers taking turns to attend upon him, so that he should 
not become bored. He had a secretary who opened his 
mail and to whom he dictated liis correspondence, for he 
hardly ever wrote and never signed his name. On 
Sundays, when at mass time the "scamp" went to church, 
he was always followed by a valet carrying a cushion and 
a prayer book. . . . On hearing all this, the Prefect of 
the Department advised that the proceedings be 
abandoned and that all those eccentric persons should 
be sent "to the lunatic asylum." But Batelier held his 
ground; he knew that they accused him of wanting to 
commit a fresh regicide and perhaps he did show, in get- 
ting up the case, a personal animosity : he prolonged the 
enquiry for five months and on February 17th, 1802, only, 
the Tribunal of Vitry condemned Hervagault who during 
the trial sheltered his dignity behind almost absolute 

'Letter from Batelier of the 7th of Vend^miaire, quoted by G. 
Laurent, p. 63 note. 

S09 



THE DAUPHIN 

silence, to four years' imprisonment. Mme. Saignes, ac- 
cused of complicity, heard a verdict of acquittal pro- 
nounced in her favor. 

The two parties appealed: the Procurator in the hope 
of obtaining Mme. Saignes' condemnation; Hervagault's 
partisans with the certainty that this iniquitous judg- 
ment, solely inspired by Batelier's rancour, would be re- 
versed before another court. Never before, in fact, in 
legal annals had a condemnation for swindling been pro- 
nounced without a complaint being previously laid. Now, 
not only did the "swindled persons" not complain but they 
begged to be allowed to continue their presents. No law, 
they said, through the medium of Maitre Hatot and 
Maitre Caffin, council for the accused, no law forbid the 
son of a poor tailor being treated with honour or forbade 
the kissing of his hand or the serving of him at table. 
They knew that their guest was no other than Jean Marie 
Hervagault, born at Saint L6 of modest parents ; it was as 
such that they entertained him, feted him, surrounded him 
with care and homage. Such was the thesis which Maitre 
Caffin prepared to uphold before the Court of Appeal at 
Reims. Hervagault had been transferred to that town on 
March 16th, 1802. Mgr. de Savine had followed him 
then in the capacity of Grand Almoner and, considering 
that it was urgent that this descendant of kings should 
found a family of authentic Bourbons, before succumbing 
under the blows of his redoubtable enemies, he offered him 
the choice between sisters as "amiable as they were interest- 
ing," all three natives of Dauphine — which was almost 
symbolic — and daughters of the Marquis V. de L. . . . , 
who himself was the natural son of Louis XV and MUe. de 
Nesle. Hervagault, faithful to the memory of the King 
of Portugal's sister-in-law, resisted somewhat and gave 
way to the prelate's entreaties only out of consideration 
to the future of the monarchy.^ Unfortunately, Fouche, 

*Beauchamp, pp. 179 and 180, Beauchamp who, with an interval 
of fifteen years, wrote two narratives of Hervagault's adventure, 

310 



AT RANDOM 

Minister of Police, was informed, most probably by Bate- 
lier, his former colleague at the Convention, of the inci- 
dents which troubled Champagne, with the result that he 
"lodged a detainer against" Hervagault with the commis- 
sioner of the government sitting at Reims. "In case this 
individual should be acquitted," he wrote, "you must take 
the necessary measures to have him brought before me 
immediately," ^ and from the first days of incarceration in 
his new prison the accused was, "as a measure of high 
policy," kept in a sort of solitary confinement, only the 
magistrates and his advocate obtaining authorisation to 
enter his cell. He was a prisoner of State. 

However, the interest inspired at this time by the ad- 
venturer's enigmatic figure was declining daily. Too 
many people had unconsciously prompted the role, so one 
can no longer be astonished it was known by heart. We 
must, therefore, curtail the narrative of this uncommon 
life by confining ourselves to a narration of its most strik- 
ing peripetics. On April 3rd, 1802, contrary to general 
expectations, the tribunal confirmed, as regards Herva- 
gault, the Vitry judgment and condemned Mme. Saign€s 
to six months' imprisonment.^ The crowd which had 
taken the audience chamber by storm cheered the 
"Dauphin's" counsel and received the announcement of 
the verdict "with marks of vexation and indignation." A 
collection in favor of the condemned man resulted in "con- 
siderable proceeds" and, rich in money and jewels, he was 
locked up in prison. The disheartened Savine, whom the 
"initiates" nicknamed "the French Blondel," lived in a 
state of great anxiety, for, well informed, he knew that 
Fouche would not allow "the son of Louis XVI to complete 
his term of imprisonment peacefully; he feared deporta- 

gives August 25th, St. Louis's Day, as the date on which the formal 
demand for the hand of one of the granddaughters of Louis XV 
was made. 

^Letter of the 24th of Vent6se, year X (March 15th, 1802). 

^G. Laurent has published in full the speech for the prosecution 
of Chaix, the Government Commissioner to the Tribunal of the Marne. 

311 



THE DAUPHIN 

tion, perhaps worse, and consequently organised a watch 
in the neighbourhood of the jail in order to be the first 
to be informed of any suspicious preparation. 

He determined to rescue his well beloved prince from 
the hands of the gendarmes, and with this object in view 
waited for four months, sometimes sleeping in a ditch by 
the roadside in order to be certain not to miss the passing 
of his idol. On August 24th, 1802, he learnt that Herva- 
gault had left for Soissons, "where he was called to give 
evidence as a witness in a criminal case." ^ The ex-bishop 
set off in pursuit, arrived at Soissons at the same time as 
Hervagault, hurried to the prison and asked for an 
authorisation to enter it. As this was refused he put a 
louts d'or in the doorkeeper's hand with the request that 
it be handed to the accused. His emotion and insistence 
awakened suspicion. Whereupon they asked for liis name 
and profession. "Ex-bishop of Viviers," he replied. He 
was then taken to the sub-prefecture, where his passport, 
which he was requested to produce, was found to describe 
him as an "employe." This resulted in the arrest of the 
ex-prelate, who thus entered the prison they had just re- 
fused to open to him.^ But Hervagault was only pas- 
sing through Soissons and the same evening he was taken 
to Reims. Savine remained imprisoned at Soissons until 
the day he was sent to Paris. Questioned, he declared 
clearly "that he believed that his pupil was the son of 
Louis XVI, basing his opinion on information collected 
since he had been searching for the origin of this young 
man." ^ Whereupon he was sent to Charenton and, to 
crown his misfortune, this escapade drew Fouche's atten- 
tion to the Dauphin of the Marne. Curious to see this 
youth who wherever he passed aroused such ardent de- 
votion, he ordered that Hervagault be brought to Paris. 
On the night of September 12-13, 1802, the gendarmerie 

^National Archives, F\ 6312. 

^The same. 

^Histoire des deux faux Dauphins. , . . 

312 



AT RANDOM 

removed the prisoner from prison and conducted him f roni 
brigade to brigade towards the capital. He passed 
through Soissons on the 14th, through the Villers-Cotter- 
ets on the 15th, and on the 18th arrived at Bourget, where 
he was handed over to the gendarmes of the Seine. . . . 
But Fouche was no longer minister, the ministry of police 
having been suppressed three days before, and Hervagault, 
with whom they did not know what to do, was sent to 
Bicetre, the great receptacle of all crimes, of every mis- 
fortune and of every depravement. 

And yet it was at the time when Hervagault entered 
this hell that he was nearest to supreme triumph. It is 
not rash to take seriously an allegation of his first 
historian, Beauchamp, whose sources of information are 
not to be despised, since this writer, attached to the offices 
of the general police from the days of the Committee of 
General Safety until 1806, was able to satisfy his curi- 
osity as a historian by delving into the files to which his 
duties allowed him free access.-^ Now, he states that 
Fouche proposed to Bonaparte that he turn the false 
Dauphin of Vitry to account by solemnly recognising him 
as the son of Louis XVI, by then obtaining from him, 
either by terror or by seduction, the renunciation of his 
rights to the throne. "But," he adds, "Bonaparte re- 
jected this means of usurpation as unworthy of his high 
fortune and henceforth Hervagault was destined to im- 
prisonment and misfortune." ^ However, the unfortunate 

^It is easy to prove that Beauchamp had in his hands, not only the 
Vitry and Reims files but also the documents which now compose 
the Hervagault file at the National Archives. 

^Histoire des deux faux Dauphins by Alphonse de Beauchamp. 
Paris, 1818. This work was, as already stated, the second study de- 
voted by Beauchamp to Hervagault, the first having appeared in 
1803 under the title Le faux Dauphin en France, ou histoire d'un 
imposteur se disant le dernier fils de Louis XVI, rMigi sur des pieces 
authentiques et notamment sur le jugement du Tribunal Criminal 
du departement de la Marne. It is not without utility to point out 
that, in raking up this delicate subject again at the time of 
the Restoration, Beauchamp, who prided himself on his Royalism, 
nevertheless displays a certain leaning towards his hero; he does 
not waver in his opinion that he was an imposter, but he accumu- 

313 



THE DAUPHIN 

man struggled. Reduced to the pitiless regime of Bicetre 
and believing that he was abandoned by all his partisans, 
"he strove to overcome the inaptitude which had up to 
then made him rebellious to study ;" he applied himself and 
read with profit ; we are even assured that he succeeded 
in translating Latin authors and took pleasure in reading 
Horace and Tacitus — as Louis XVI had done in the 
Temple. 

Meanwhile his faithful followers continued their efforts 
and spent money without reckoning. The whole of the 
Jacquier family left Vitry to settle down at Nancy, where 
an attempt was made to group proselytes. It was af- 
firmed that the son of Louis XVI existed; that his two 
uncles, the Comte de Provence and the Comte d'Artois, 
notwithstanding their repugnance, but forced by foreign 
Courts, had solemnly and by an authentic document rec- 
ognised him. A manifesto was printed ^ which was soon 
to appear. It was in order to forestall its effect that the 
Princes had attempted, through George Cadoudal, to as- 
sassinate Bonaparte. But the Dauphin had been opposed 
to that crime. Was it not to his interest to manifest him- 
self only after the Usurper had firmly established the 
monarchy.'' "Legions were being prepared secretly 
notably in Normandy in Picardy and in Franche-Conte," 
and the number of partisans increased daily. The Jac- 
quiers possessed friends in all the administrations and 
even in the office of the general police; they were certain 

lates facts of a nature to make one believe the very opposite. It 
is true, that, in 1818, Hervagault being dead, he no longer troubled 
the reigning king: it was a question at that time of ruining the 
credit of another false Dauphin and they could not better succeed 
in so doing than by making the first, to the detriment of his imitator, 
interesting. 

^Was this the manifesto of Charles X, King of France, referred to 
in Fouche's bulletin of January 11th, 1805? See la Police SecrHe du 
Premier Empire: bulletins quotedieus adressSs par Fouch4 a 
I'Empereur published by Ernest d'Hauterive, in accordance with un- 
published original documents. Vol. I, December 18th, 1805. No. 
766. The manifesto, reported at Toulouse in 1805, appeared in 
1806. Bibliotheque Nationale. La 35, 14. 

314 



AT RANDOM 

of not being troubled; never would the Government dare 
to run the risk of an exposure. . . .^ 

It did better: it waited until time and the intoxication 
of victory made people forget the past. Who would have 
the audacity, after Austerlitz, to set up a ghost of twenty 
years against the master of the world? Consequently 
Hervagault for forty-one months led a life of poverty and 
abandonment. When, on February 17th, 1806, he at last 
left Bicetre (at twenty-five years of age if he were really 
the son of the tailor of St. L6) he was without a sou in his 
pocket and as a reference possessed nothing but a paper 
stating that he had left the infamous prison and obliging 
him to return to Saint L6 by a given route. 

It has since been learnt that, on leaving Bicetre in the 
morning, the liberated man, still clothed in his prison rags, 
directed his footsteps towards the Faubourg St. Germain, 
where he made enquiries for the residences of certain noble 
families of the old Court. He knocked at several doors, 
but the footmen refused to listen to the ragged enquirer. 
How was he to find shelter for the night in Paris where he 
knew no one? At dusk he returned to the centre of the 
town. One of his companions at Bicetre, named Emman- 
uel, had given him the address of his wife, who lived not 
far from Saint Jacques la Boucherie, and towards this old 
church, standing amidst a network of tortuous streets, 
Hervagault proceeded. He discovered the house indi- 
cated and made enquiries for the woman Emmanuel, but 
found she was absent and was told to come back later.^ 
Just opposite the church door, in the Rue des Ecrivains, 

^National Archives, A F IV, 1492. Fouches bulletins. See d' 
Hauterive, Vol. 1, No. 927, February 18th, 1805. Indeed, notwith- 
standing the fact that she was reported by local authorities to be 
the prime mover in a vast conspiracy, or rather in a gigantic swindle, 
Mme. Jacquier was not disturbed. The authorities contented them- 
selves by watching her discreetly. Also see the same work Vol. 
1, no. 942. 

^At a little later period we find a mention of a certain Emmanuel, 
an Israelite, and hawker, married to a woman named Sophie Moyse. 
This Emmanuel was killed on July 28th, 1830, during street fighting. 
Perhaps he was the son of Hervagault's prison companion. 

315 



THE DAUPHIN 

was a well-stocked pastry-cook's, kept by M. and Mme. 
Boizard,^ and opposite the shop-window, set out with tarts 
and brioches, stood Hervagault, worn out with fatigue. 
The pastry-cook's wife, watching over her goods, caught 
sight of this poverty-stricken and sorry individual and, 
overcome with pity, asked him what he was doing there. 
As he humbly replied that he was waiting for a neighbour- 
ing lady, she invited him to enter her shop, took him into 
the room at the back, gave him a chair and returned to 
her customers. 

Returning shortly afterwards to the back shop in order 
to keep an eye on the unknown man, she found him with 
his face buried in his hands and sobbing over a little 
portrait of Louis XVI, painted on silk, which he had un- 
hooked from the wall. The good woman expressed 
astonishment. Had he known the King? Had his 
parents served that unfortunate prince? Hervagault, 
stifled with tears, was unable to reply. At that moment 
M. Boizard appeared on the scene, asked for an explana- 
tion, reproached his wife for having been too confiding, 
and began to question the young man whom she had im- 
prudently welcomed. Had he even any papers? 

The wretched man drew the paper on which his route was 
marked from his pocket. What ! he had come out of 
Bicetre! Why had he been in prison there? Were his 
parents still living.'' To these questions the vaga- 
bond replied only with tears. The Boizards, moved as 
much as puzzled, honest folks and, moreover. Royalist 
and charitable, supposed that their visitor belonged to 
some noble family that had emigrated, and not having the 

^This episode, which is related by Beauchamp, in accordance with 
reports which have not been found, is one of those which it is very 
difficult to control. However, although the directories of the time 
do not mention any pastry cook bearing the name of Boizard, we 
find a certain Paul Jean Boizard whose trade is not indicated, and 
who was born in Paris on November 6th, 1754, and married on No- 
vember 7th, 1787, at St. Jacques la Boucherie to Jeanne Marie 
Bachard, a simple presumption of the veracity of Beauchamp's 
narrative. 

316 



AT RANDOM 

courage to send away a young man with so honest and 
gentle an appearance they offered to shelter him for the 
night, hoping to hear more the next day. But they ob- 
tained no disclosure, their guest confining himself to re- 
peating that he was "a child of misfortune" and begging 
"that they guide him out of Paris and leave him there 
without troubling any more about him." Seeing that he 
was weak and suffering, the pastry cook and his wife 
had no difficulty in retaining him until he was in a 
condition to set off. They procured suitable clothes for 
him, took him to the opera and the Varieties and showed 
themselves full of obliging attentions towards the forlorn 
creature, no longer doubting, after close observation, he 
was "the son of some very great lord." Worried with 
questions, he ended by declaring that he was the son of 
Louis XVI and Marie Antoinette, but begged that they 
keep the secret. "I am frightened of being arrested," he 
said. "I have already been so wretched !" ^ 

What an agitating piece of news for those Parisian 
shopkeepers who had lived in the days of the good king 
and the beautiful queen ! To think that they sheltered in 
their room the fair Dauphin of the Trianon, the child of 
the tragic legend, the pupil of the odious Simon ! They 
were so wonderstruck and agitated by it that they feared 
to be undeceived and were never tired of questioning "the 
prince," of hearing him relate his recollection of the Tuil- 
eries, or Varennes and of the Temple. There was not a 
personage of the old Court he did not know. He re- 
membered the names of certain commissioners who had 
guarded the Royal family at the prison and asked what 
had become of them. Unable to contain herself any 
longer, Mme. Boizard went to share her happiness with 
an ecclesiastic whom she revered, the Cure of Saint-Ger- 
main-des-Pres. "He is an impostor; the Dauphin is 
dead," said the priest. Then, after a moment's reflexion, 
he added : "There are, however, some very strange things. 

^Beauchamp, pp. 234 and following. 

317 



THE DAUPHIN 

. . ." Being watched and not daring to ascertain the 
identity of the personage himself, he concluded: "Return 
in a few days and I will give you my definite opinion." 
The pastry cook's wife returned, in fact, and this time 
the Cure was very affirmative: "The Dauphin is dead. 
Rid yourself of the man." That was how, well provided 
with money, well supplied with clothes and books by his 
hosts, who also made him a present of the portrait of 
Louis XVI, Hervagault left Paris in the early days of 
March, 1806, continuing his mysterious and fatal odyssey. 
On March 11th, he called on the Prefect of the Manche, 
who urged him to live honestly "by his trade as a 
tailor." — "My trade ! My trade !" exclaimed Hervagault, 
raising his eyes heavenwards and seeking, wrote the Pre- 
fect, "to give himself the airs of a fallen prince." How- 
ever, "he saw clearly that he must live unknown and 
promised never to forget the obscurity of his family," 
but "all this with entangled expressions and the tone of 
a man who obeyed authority but without absolutely re- 
nouncing his role." ^ He did not renounce it, indeed, 
for when summer came, he disappeared, went back to 
Vitry and, after an absence of nearly a month, returned 
to Sain L6. Hervagault pere did not wish to have any- 
thing more to do with this incorrigible young man and 
begged the Prefect to rid him of him. ^'Incorporate the 
delinquent in the Colonial battalion of Belle-Isle-en-Mer,^* 
scribbled Fouche, who was once more Minister, after two 
years' holiday, on the margin of the report.^ So we see the 
false Dauphin with a band of recruits on their way to 
Brittany. Before reaching Montcontour he succeeded in 
escaping from the gendarmes. Seen at Auray, calling 
at house to house, this time under the name of Hervagault, 

^Letter from the Prefect of the Manche to the Minister. National 
Archives, F' 6312. It is somewhat interesting to note that, at the 
time Hervagault set out for Normandy, a watch was kept over 
the Marquise de Tourzel and her family, who were staying at the 
Chateau d'Abondant, Eure-et-Loir. National Archives, A. FIV. 1497, 
and o'Hauterive, Vol. II, No. 473. 

^The same reference. 

318 



AT RANDOM 

he was captured, placed under close watch, and taken to 
Belle Isle. But immediately his good looks brought 
about fresh miracles. Major Adelbert, the head of the 
battalion, "intimately convinced of his fabulous origin," 
treated him with distinction ; whilst other ofRcers, including 
General Rolan and General Quantin themselves, showed 
themselves extraordinarily indulgent towards the scamp, 
a precious portrait of whom is furnished by a note of 
that period. "With an interesting but effeminate face, 
he possesses a delicate complexion which is due, it ap- 
pears, to his long imprisonment and the use of wine and 
strong liquors. His character is irascible and passion- 
ate. He is naturally acute, but has no education; he 
hardly knows how either to read or to write. His whole 
system consists in treating everything around him with 
disdain, in receiving with a sort of contempt what is 
stupidly offered him, and in affecting generosity. . . ." ^ 
But to those who were impressed by the touching legend, 
what was there astonishing in Simon's pupil having no 
more instruction than his "Mentor," in the fact that 
he loved wine; what was there astonishing in the little 
Dauphin, formerly frolicsome and wilful, having become 
an "irascible and passionate" man.? 

To be able merely to suppose that this poor degraded 
fellow was the descendant of the Kings of France is 
sufficient to enable us to pardon him everything. The 
most justified grievances turn, in the eyes of believers, 
in his favour. That was why he was to be seen so little 
at drill and still less on fatigue-duty. Nor did he ap- 
pear any longer in barracks, but was lodged in a private 
house and went about on horseback "dressed in civilian 
clothes and followed by an orderly attached to his 
service." From the continent he received letters, money, 
jewelry, "sweetmeats," and found open credit in all the 
shops of the little town of Palais, where his debts soon 

^National Archives, F' 6312. 

319 



THE DAUPHIN 

amounted to 2,500 francs.* One day, riding on his island, 
which had become almost his kingdom, he met the Abbe 
Cavadec, the Cure of Sauzon. Hailing him, he asked 
whether he knew any trustworthy persons who could go 
to Paris, where he would be well received. In the presence 
of the Ecclesiastic's amazement, he exclaimed: "Don't 
you know who I am?" Whereupon the Cure hastened 
to make off, having no desire to compromise himself, "and 
be shut up for the rest of his days in the cells of the 
Castle of Ham, like three or four other priests." ^ Such 
was Hervagault's reputation that he was promoted to the 
position of being a "danger" to the State, with the whole 
administration of the Empire, it appears, leagued against 
him. In November, 1808, the Colonial battalion em- 
barked at Lorient on the Cyhele. One of the officers on 
board was a young surgeon of twenty-two, named 
Robert,^ who was called upon to attend the soldier 
Hervagault, in whom "he discovered estimable qualities." 
Friendly intercourse sprang up between the two young 
men, who were almost of the same age, and so much so 
that Hervagault, touched by the attentions Robert 
showed him, confided to him that he hoped he would see 
the frigate captured by the English. "My fate would 
then be assured," he murmured. Despite this hardly 
patriotic wish Hervagault, when the Cyhele was attacked 
a few days later by an enemy corvette, fought so val- 
iantly that the captain — an Italian named Christiano — 
said openly: "That young man has merited the Cross 
of the Legion of Honour ten times over, but I cannot 
recommend him for it without compromising myself." 
As Robert expressed astonishment at this remark, he 
learnt that, "according to formal orders from the Gov- 

^National Archives, AF IV 1502. 

The same file. 

'Joachim-Marie Robert, born at Vannes January 18th, 1786, medi- 
cal officer of the third class on the frigate Cyb^le from November 11th, 
1808, to March 27th, 1809. Archives of the Ministry of War, 

320 



AT RANDOM 

eminent, Hervagault was to be shot if the vessel was 
threatened with capture by the Enghsh."^ 

The medical officer, very surprised at this disclosure, 
obtained an explanaton when, in the course of April, 
1809, the battalion having landed at Sables d'Olonne, 
Hervagault revealed his royal origin to Robert. "If 
I had made this confession sooner," he added, "you might 
have believed that I wanted you to interest yourself in my 
lot. But now your protection is no longer necessary to 
me and you cannot doubt that I am telling you the 
truth." ^ When they were on shore, Hervagault enter- 
tained Robert with a "splendid" dinner and visited with 
him some chateau along the coast, the inhabitants of 
Avhich showed him "marks of the profoundest respect." 
Then he pushed on into the interior of Vendee and the 
surgeon returned to his depot. In order to preserve the 
recollection of "these extraordinary events'* he kept a 
diary, in which they were set down with the greatest 
precision.^ 

We here lose trace of Hervagault. Apparently he 
deserted, borrowed money, came to Paris and hid himself 
for a fortnight, first of all at the house of a lady named 
Deservinanges, formerly attached to the household of 
the Comte d' Artois and then with his pretended sister. 
Mile. Hervagault, 40 rue de la Porte Montmartre. He 
went to Strasbourg, and crossed the Rhine with the ob- 
ject of reaching Vienna, but the movements of the French 
army forcing him to retrace his steps, he stopped 
at Versailles at the house of a Comtesse de Bethune,'* 
who died during his stay. He then decided to get to 
England, blit was arrested at Rouen, where a document 
reports his passage: a letter from the Prefect of the 

^National Archives, F' 6979. Document 115. 

^The same. 

^The same file. It must be pointed out with what reserve Beau- 
champ, when he wrote his history of the Deux faux Dauphitis, at the 
time of the Restoration, summarised this document of which he 
evidently had knowledge. 

*Or Beclune. The name is hardly readable. 

321 



THE DAUPHIN 

Seine-Inferieure before whom he appeared. He was 
penniless ; upon him were found only a gold watch, worth 
from four to five louis, a rosary, and a small volume 
bearing the title Histoire de Notre Dame de Liesse. 
Around his neck, attached to a black ribbon, was a 
copper medal on which was engraved, on one side, the 
figure of the Holy Virgin and on the other a Christ with 
the legend Consummatum est. Whilst they were search- 
ing him he was seen to put a piece of paper in his mouth 
and tear it up between his teeth. They took possession 
of the fragments, joined them together, and read four 
lines of verse insulting to his majesty, the Emperor.^ 
Medal and quatrain are still attached, in the portfolio 
at the Archives, to the report which the Prefect sub- 
mitted to His Excellency. Hervagault, brought to Paris 
under good escort, was imprisoned without judgment at 
Bicetre as a measure of high policy. This time, con- 
quered, he understood there was no hope of revenge. In 
that hell from which he was never to come out alive, de- 
based by promiscuity with the most repugnant char- 
acters, undermined by vile diseases, he foundered in ab^ 
jection and despair. Hervagault pere and Nicole Bigot 
were, however, still living, but they do not seem to have 
paid the slightest attention to the lot of their child. . . . 
On the day of his death — it was May 8th, 1812 — a 
priest who was present during his last moments attempted 
to exhort the dying man and arouse his contrition by 
pointing out to him that his imposture was the cause 
of his misfortune. At the word "imposture," Hervagault, 
with a start, protested at the moment of appearing be- 
fore God that he was the son of Louis XVI and Marie 
Antoinette. Overcome with agitation, he sank further 
under his bedclothes, turned his head and maintained an 

^"Ennemi des Bourbons dont je re9us I'homone (sic) 
Vil flatteur de Barras, j'^pousai sa. . . . 
Je proscrivis Moreau, j'assassinai s'Anguin (sic) 
Et pour comble d'horreur, je monte sur le throne." 

National Archives, F', 6312. 

322 



AT RANDOM 

obstinate silence until the end.^ His name appears in 
the register of the Grand Hospice de Bicetre.^ We also 
find it in the burial book of the chapel of the establish- 
ment,^ and again in the register of the Commune of Gen- 
tilly, where, under the proper date, in the list of deaths, 
we read the following details, evidently transcribed from 
the jail book: "Jean Marie Hervagalt, aged 30, 
bachelor, son of , and of ," as though the pen 

of the careless writer of this incomplete certificate had 
refused to violate the secret of the dead man, whom the 
pauper's grave was to receive. 

^Beauchamp. 

-Archives of the Prefecture of Police. 

'"Has been buried by me, the undersigned priest, Jean-Marie 
Hervagault, Langolin, Chaplain." 



323 



CHAPTER VIII 



ENQUIRIES 



Mgr. de Savine left Charenton transformed by cap- 
tivity. Whether because the lesson had taught him not 
to run about after nomadic Dauphins or because he was 
"too closely watched" -^ all relations ceased between 
him and Hervagault as soon as the latter entered the 
prison of Bicetre. However, the ex-prelate did not ab- 
jure his faith in the prisoner*s royal origin. In Sep- 
tember, 1803, we see him circulating in Paris "a manu- 
script account of his fortunate meeting with the son of 
Louis XVI" and of the plan he had formed of marrying 
"the descendant of Kings with one of the granddaughters 

of Marshal de L " ^ This profession of devotion 

inspired in the police spy who reported it the convic- 
tion that "the ex-bishop was out of his mind." This 
last attempt being unsuccessful, Savine renounced the 
apostleship in order to devote himself entirely to peni- 
tence, and withdrew to his province, to Embrun, where 
his old mother was still living. But this woman, formerly 
given to philosophy and a "free thinker," was herself, 
at ninety years of age, touched with grace. Having be- 
come an ardent Christian, she had contended for the 
honour of entertaining the Holy Father at her house on 
the occasion of his passage through Embrun and, as 
her desire could not be granted, she implored the favour 
of sending at least one of her own armchairs to the house 

^National Archives, F' 3704. September 12th, 1803, and Tableau 
de la Situation de Paris, A. Aulard. Paris sous la Consulat, Paris, 
Vol. IV, p. 369. 

^he same. 

324 



ENQUIRIES 

where the Pope was stopping.^ When the former Bishop 
of Viviers presented himself, repentant, at the Chateau 
de Savine, quite determined to live there in retirement, 
his mother refused to receive him, on the plea that she 
would never pardon the unworthy prelate*s scandalous 
conduct.^ He accepted the affront with resignation and 
began to weep over his mistakes. "My eyes are open 
to my past errors," he wrote in 1805. ... "I disavow 
and deplore with all my heart the unexampled faults I 
have committed. ... I beg the clergy of Viviers to 
pardon my misconduct and to remember it only in order 
to pity me and to pray to God for me. . . ." ^ In an- 
other letter, dated 1811, he drew so "deplorable" a pic- 
ture of his ascetic interior that the pious journalist, in 
setting down these details, chose to believe "that the 
Bishop, in the excess of his contrition, had somewhat 
exaggerated the colours." ^ That was not so. Mgr. de 
Savine had condemned himself to austerities the severity 
of which hastened his end, and heaven thus spared him 
fresh perplexities, for, less than a year later, the en- 
thusiastic credulity of the versatile Bishop would have 
been subjected to ciiiel trials. 

If Louis XVIII, when entering Paris on May 3rd, 

1814, imagined that the acclamations which welcomed him 

were due to sympathy inspired by his person, he flattered 

himself with an illusion as false as it was unjustified, 

for the cries of love were addressed, not to himself, who 

was quite unknown to the new generation, but to the 

daughter of Louis XVI, seated by his side in the gala 

coach. There was repentance in that great popular 

demonstration and, like the ex-bishop of Viviers, Parisians 

acknowledged their fault in their own fashion by falling 

into raptures on seeing the triumphal entrance into their 

^The Abb6 Sicard. L'ancien clergS de France, Vol. I, p. 30. 

*Simon Brugal, loc. cit. 

'L'ami de la Religion et du Boi, Vol. V, p. 337, 

*The same, Vol. IV, p. 465. 

325 



THE DAUPHIN 

city of that daughter of the King of France who, the 
last time they had seen her, twenty-two years before, 
was being conducted, amidst hooting, with her father, 
her mother, her brother and her aunt, towards the old 
prison Tower which all her family were to leave for the 
scaffold or the common grave. There was great emotion 
when it was learnt that Madame, on reaching Notre 
Dame, where the procession first went, threw herself on 
her prayer stool and remained for a long time prostrated 
with her face in her hands, shaking with sobs, and that 
she fainted on entering that Chateau of the Tuileries 
which evoked so many recollections and was haunted by 
so many phantoms. Out of that tragic distance there 
arose — more pity-exciting than all others — the face of 
the little Dauphin, of him who ought to have been the 
hero of that triumphal entry, and whose absence was the 
cause of bitter remorse at the bottom of every heart. 
Although he was not one of the survivors, it was, then, by 
the legend of the Temple that Louis XVIII benefited on 
that day of resurrection, and soon people were astonished 
that he did not appear to realise it. 

A month had hardly elapsed when an unpardonable 
blunder was committed. June 8th, 1814, was the nine- 
teenth anniversary of the death of Louis XVII, and one 
might have expected that this date, coming round for the 
first time since the Restoration of the Bourbons, would 
have furnished the opportunity for a solemn commemora- 
tion. He to whom the crown had come, owing to so 
many deaths, owed at the very least, people thought, the 
homage of a ceremony propitiatory to the young prince 
from whom he inherited. Without a word of agreement 
having been uttered, the whole of France united in prayer 
in memory of the little King and Martyr. There were 
funeral ceremonies at Amiens, Orleans, Tours, Rennes, 
Tarbes, Alen^on, La Rochelle and many other towns. 
. . .^ But at Saint Germain I'Auxerrois, the parish 
^National Archives, Fla 581. 

326 



ENQUIRIES 

church of the Palace of the Tuileries, nothing! It is 
true a mass was said at Saint Roch, where the Duchesse 
d'Angouleme attended in deep mourning, but care was 
taken, in the report of that anonymous obit, that the 
name of the Dauphin should not be mentioned. L'ami de 
la Religion et du Roi, the official and scrupulous re- 
corder of such ceremonies, manifestly avoided, when 
relating that requiem, any allusion to Louis XVII. 
"There was celebrated on June 8th, at Saint-Roch," it 
announced, "a solemn service for the Princes and 
Princesses who were victims of the Revolution." ^ One 
can only explain this astonishing reticence by the pre- 
caution not to compromise the reigning King by asso- 
ciating him with a formal recognition of the hypothetical 
death of liis predecessor. 

Louis XVIII was hardly installed before he gave orders 
that the exact spot where the bodies of Louis XVI and 
Marie Antoinette ^ were buried in the Madeleine cemetery 
be sought for; but they forgot to undertake a similar 
enquiry regarding Louis XVII. The child of the Temple, 
who had so many devotees in France and especially at 
Paris, was as much disdained by his relatives at the 
Tuileries as though he had belonged to the usurper's dis- 
honoured race : not to mention him was to pay him court. 

^L'ami de la Religion et du Roi, Vol. I, p. 254. A funeral service 
had, it is sure, been celebrated at Notre Dame on May 10th, 1814, 
in honour of Louis XVI, Marie Antoinette, Madame Elizabeth and 
Louis XVII. It is a singular thing that the death of the last named 
in the Temple is not once recalled in the article which L'ami de la 
Religion devoted to that ceremony. There were, indeed, four abso- 
lutions but as the Abbe Legris-Duval, in his discourse, associated the 
Due d'Enghien with the four above mentioned deaths, we do not 
know whether one of those absolutions was applied by name to the 
lost Dauphin. Was the young age of the deceased an obstacle canon- 
ically to the celebration of a religious ceremony? No, since the re- 
ligious journal mentions a few lines lower down, and, moreover, in 
terms equally strained, "a service celebrated at Chartres for the two 
kings we have lost." 

-This exploration was made without publicity on May 18th, 1814, 
by the Marquis d'Ambray, High Chancellor of France, accompanied by 
the Comte de Blacas. The report of their visit was published by the 
Abbe Savorin in Notice historique sur la Chapelle expiatoire, . . . 
p. 200. 

327 



THE DAUPHIN 

And when, in January, 1815, the remains of Louis 
XVI and Marie Antoinette were exhumed to remove 
them to Saint Denis, it was already agreed that they 
should tacitly renounce rendering similar homage to the 
mortal remains of their child. Fatality pursued the inno- 
cent boy beyond the tomb, and, as in the distant days 
political parties disputed over his guardianship, it seemed 
as though his shade was still suspected by the Government 
and was more embarrassing than his frail personality 
had been to the Committees of the Convention. These 
omissions did not fail to disturb public opinion. People 
whose recollections went back to the time of the Revolu- 
tion remembered the incredulity with which the sudden 
announcement of the Dauphin's death was received in 
1795. The negligence of the Restoration revived these 
doubts, which the Government of Louis XVIII ought to 
have striven to suppress, and the survival of Louis XVII 
was already rallying many people of undecided mind when 
the rumour spread that the Dauphin had just been found 
in Brittany. 

In the month of September of 1815, a suspicious person 
who had recently landed at Saint-Malo was arrested by 
order of M. Pierre Pierre, extraordinary lieutenant of 
police of that town. The poor devil in question appeared 
to be thirty years of age and was without papers. He 
declared that his name was Charles de Navarre, a native 
of New Orleans and that he was a baker by trade. But 
soon, "changing his tone," he affirmed with assurance 
that he was the Dauphin, the son of Louis XVI, and 
he handed to M. Pierre Pierre a letter which he had just 
written to his uncle, the reigning king, Louis XVIII le 
Desire. 

The lieutenant of police immediately telegraphed and 
the same day sent in a report to M. d'Allonville, Prefect 
of Ille-et-Vilaine. All the authorities of the Department 

S28 



ENQUIRIES 

were informed of the event, and the correspondence ex- 
changed between them on that subject gives evidence of an 
assurance and a security more declamatory, perhaps, 
than sincere. For, much more than had formerly been 
the case in Champagne, Brittany now blazed up at the 
news that "the little Dauphin" had returned. If the 
functionaries affected contempt for this "wretched per- 
son" who was disturbing public tranquillity, the common 
people, country folk, and even the middle-classes of the 
whole district displayed joyous amazement, so much did 
the suffocating nightmare of the Temple still weigh on 
every heart. — "A huge crowd followed the fellow when 
he was led through the streets of Saint-Malo," wrote 
Comte de Kererpertz, sub-Prefect of Fougeres. — "A 
thousand absurd rumours have been current and are 
still current, and the populace has gathered in the 
neighbourhood of the prison," reported the Chevalier du 
Petit-Thouars, his colleague at Saint-Malo. — "All minds 
are in the state of agitation." — "This arrest is the sole 
topic of conversation at Saint-Malo and Saint-Servan. 
It was the news of the market here. People the least 
tender towards the August Family who govern us show 
themselves very touched by the lot of this unfortunate 
young man. . . ." Such was the impression produced 
by this touching resurrection, and one must confess that 
the "fellow" in no way justified it. His manners were 
common; he spoke like a peasant, adorning his phrases, 
for instance, with such expressions as "pour lors" and 
"quoique ga" and making such errors in pronunciation as 
"Us tombirenf and "le Rugent" (for "le Regent"). But 
it was known that, at his first examination, he had lost his 
temper, demanding to be taken to Paris and declaring that 
before the King, his uncle, and the Princess, he would 
prove the strength of his statements in a striking manner. 
Moreover, his intention was to let Louis XVIII reign in 
peace, "even to serve him faithfully,'* and only to ascend 

329 



THE DAUPHIN 

the throne when this well-beloved uncle was dead.^ These 
audacious remarks impressed people's imaginations as so 
many irrefutable arguments and simple folk, imagining 
that a man could not be sufficiently bold to lie so un- 
blushingly, gave way to the belief in a miracle, awaited 
and hoped for for a long time past. 

The rumour of the Hervagault adventure had hardly 
passed, twelve years before, beyond the confines of Cham- 
pagne; the thoughts of the country were not directed 
at that time towards the eventuality of the re-establish- 
ment of the Bourbons and, moreover, people ran a great 
risk under the Consulat in appearing to be interested in 
recollections of the monarchy. But now "the return of 
the lilies" restored the old traditions to a place of honour 
again. The "August Family" benefited by a revival 
of enthusiasm ; and when France learned that Louis XVII 
was not dead, one could count by thousands the belated 
Chouans and old Royalists who, from the depths of the 
Vendee to the Canebiere, cried triumphantly: "I told 
you so !" In their loyal naivete, they did not think they 
were displeasing the Government by acclaiming the legiti- 
mate and at last rediscovered king, and in their candour 
they considered that Louis XVIII ought to be as happy 
as they were themselves to see the son of Louis XVI 
emerge from the darkness. 

Such were the reasons for the prodigious success of 
Charles de Navarre. Not that the Dauphin of Saint- 
Malo equalled the one of Vitry ; as far as we are able 
to judge, he was very inferior, and we shall set down 
here only those episodes of his long and intricate history 
which are of a nature to throw some retrospective light 
on certain peripetias of the captivity in the Temple. 

Arrested, as we have seen on September 9th at Saint- 
Malo, Charles was transferred to Rennes, and from there 

^Archives of Ille-et-Vilaine. Phelippeau file. Documents repro- 
duced in full by J. de Saint-Leger. Etait-ce Louis XVII 4vade du 
Temple? 

330 



ENQUIRIES 

to Rouen, although he had asked to be taken to Paris 
"before his uncle" (Louis XVIII), and, if he was recog- 
nised to be an impostor, "tried according to the severity 
of the law." He had even as early as his arrest ad- 
dressed to the king a letter, devoid of literary preten- 
sions,^ assuring him of his submission and offering to 
provide proofs of his noble birth. Consequently, he did 
not hide his disappointment when he found himself im- 
prisoned as a vagabond, on January 29th, 1816, in 
the Rouen house of correction and mendicity, which, in 
comparison with the old prison of the Parisian suburbs, 
was called Norman Bicetre. This was a singular jail. 
Charles de Navarre's entry in the jail-book set forth that 
"every measure must be taken in regard to this fellow 
to prevent him from having any intercourse or com- 
munication with anyone whatsoever without a written 
permission signed by the mayor . . ." " and so long as 
the prisoner was penniless he had to submit to the common 
regime, eating from a bowl and sleeping on a straw 
mattress like the others. He had entered Bicetre "almost 

^The text of this letter, which is preserved in the office of the 
clerk to the Tribunal of Rouen is as follows: "Saint-Malo, Decem- 
ber 15th, 1815. Your Majesty, I beg to inform you that the Dauphin, 
son of Louis XVI, is imprisoned at Saint-Malo and begs your 
Majesty to enable him to reach you. He will give you all the par- 
ticulars which prove his birth. I have had the honour to write you 
fourteen (sic), without having received any reply, since my arrival 
from the La Plata River. All the letters may have reached you; 
but you have doubtless taken me for an imposter. But, having 
yielded to a very serious passion, I delivered myself to the police, 
who have put me in prison, having passed myself off as an American 
and under an assumed name, Charles de Navarre. On attending 
before Your Majesty you will see whether I am deceiving you and 
thenceforth I abandon myself to the severity of the law. I remain, 
submissively. Your Majesty's very humble and faithful subject." 
J. de Saint-Leger, Louis XVII dit Charles de Navarre, p. 8. This 
letter is not in Charles' hand. He dictated it to one of the prisoners 
in the Saint-Malo prison, named Pingon, an ex-soldier. Charles also 
dictated a letter sent to the Governor of the Island of Guernsey, 
as follows: "Governor, you are aware that on the 9th inst. the 
son of Louis XVI was put in prison in the said town, where he is 
now, in the hope of being summoned to Paris to be questioned. I 
beg you to bring this to the notice of his Britannic Majesty and 
his court. I salute you. Fraternally, Daufin-Bourbon." 

'National Archives, BB" 979. 

831 



THE DAUPHIN 

naked," and in order to enjoy from time to time the 
litre of wine and pipe of tobacco wliich, through habit, 
had become a need he had to work in the wooden-shoe 
workshop. Employed there for two months, his com- 
panions noted that he was not a beginner in the craft, 
and when someone complimented him on his skill he re- 
plied that "he had learned to make sabots near Angers 
and in the neighbourhood of La Fleche." ^ Nevertheless, 
he contended that he was the son of Louis XVI. And 
although this did not beyond all measure surprise his 
companions in captivity, a rabble full of vices, deceit, 
lies and poverty, the rumour spread outside the prison 
that the Bicetre house of correction contained a nameless 
prisoner who said he was the Dauphin of the Temple, 
with the result that a few inquisitive persons begged 
the doorkeeper Libois ^ to grant them the favour of 
catching a glimpse of the personage at the time he took 
exercise in the courtyard. This man Libois, in addition 
to exercising sovereignty over the house of correction, 
carried on the more lucrative trade of tavern and res- 
taurant keeper, and in the presence of his customers' liber- 
ality, his severity as a jailor weakened. By being gener- 
ous, a citizen of Rouen named Vignerot,^ was able to talk 
with the Dauphin at leisure, to furnish him with proper 
clothes and pocket money. And he did not abstain from 
priding himself on this good fortune when talking to his 
fellow citizens. Soon other visitors came, amongst them 
the Abbe Matouillet,* a priest attached to the Cathedral, 
who recruited numerous adherents for the prisoner. After 
two months' imprisonment, Charles was no longer work- 
ing in the wooden-shoe shop but was elegantly dressed, 
had money in his pocket and spent his time drinking, 
smoking and receiving. 

'Deposition of Pierre Mathieu Malandin, sabot maker, prisoner, 
'Jean Batiste Marie Libois, 59 years. 
'Manufacturer, Rue du Renard. 

*The Abbe Matouillet frequented the Bicetre prison before Charles' 
sojourn. He became, in 1819, Cure of Crecy, Eure-et-Loir. 

332 



ENQUIRIES 

The etiquette of these audiences was summary. It 
sufficed to enter the doorkeeper's, order a bottle of wine,* 
and wait until the turnkey Blanchemain went and fetched 
Louis XVII, who, without being pressed, soon appeared. 
About thirty years of age, of noble stature and "good 
appearance," with an agreeable face notwithstanding "a 
somewhat twisted" nose, "a very fine and very white skin," 
and, moreover, without affectation, "the King" sat down 
with his visitors, smoking his pipe without cessation and 
drinking in such a manner as to lead one to believe he 
was the doorkeeper's partner. One bottle followed an- 
other, accompanied by a dish of oysters and Neufchatel 
cheese. Coffee and Calvados brandy assisted in prolong- 
ing the conversation, which Charles did not think, more- 
over, of abridging, for he willingly related his history, 
how he owed his salvation to the washerwomen of the 
Temple, who had got him out of prison in a cartload of 
dirty linen, after which he was sent to Charette's army 
enclosed in a barrel. He narrated his sea voyages, his 
travels in America, and lingered over the miseries he had 
endured. One after the other, baker's boy, stone-cutter 
and soldier, he had at one time been treated as a prince, 
at another as an outlaw. Reduced to hide and wander 
in the woods, he had become familiar in the course of 
his Odyssey with numerous great lords, even potentates, 
and with many of the common people, farmers and work- 
men, and it was these who seemed to have had the most 
influence on his habits and manners. He did not know 
how to write, and as to reading was obliged to spell 
each letter. He said "I remember a collidor," meaning 

*"He told him that, to see the person in question, it was necessary 
to ask for a bottle, which was done. They shewed them into a room, 
saying they would ask Louis XVII to come down." Potel's deposi- 
tion. Archives of the Clerk of the Court of Rouen. All the docu- 
ments borrowed from these Archives and quoted below are repro- 
duced in full in Mme. de Saint-Leger's Louis XVII dit Charles de 
Navarre, which is the most important collection of orginal documents 
concerning the legal enquiry relating to the trial of Mathurin 
Bruneau. 

333 



THE DAUPHIN 

corridor; or, "I talked with M. Danguigne," for it was 
thus, after the manner of a peasant, he pronounced the 
name of M. D'Andigne. On leaving him, late at night, 
his adherents, as excited by so many emptied bottles as 
disturbed by the spectacle of a misfortune borne so cheer- 
fully, cursed the cobbler Simon, the primary cause of this 
case of decadence. 

One must not, however, accept this portrait without re- 
touches. Charles de Navarre was essentially a man of 
varied nature. If, ordinarily, he revealed himself under 
the appearance of a cunning, brutal and sometimes coarse 
lout, he retained most of the time that attitude of in- 
difference peculiar to people who, accustomed to calami- 
ties, have lost the faculty of being astonished and are 
ignorant of fear. One of his familiars, who flattered 
himself that he could "read his soul," declared that he 
saw there "a frank character, a just pride, united with 
courage, a resignation drawn from the blood of the 
'Martyr-King.' " ^ In the case of this adventurer, who 
appeared to care for nothing in the world save bottle 
and pipe, there was at times an awakening of dignity, 
a tone of command which awed the least credulous. The 
king's attorney, having visited Bicetre on March 17th, 
1816, listened to Charles de Navarre when he complained 
of being arbitrarily detained and demanded judgment. 
"We noticed in him," wrote this magistrate, "a certain 
haughty air, a tone of severity which this maniac's agree- 
able appearance and the excellent memory with which, 
it is said, he is endowed favoured fairly well. . . ." ^ He 
was of princely generosity and would put a handful of 
louis into a servant's ^ hand, or give his gold watch to a 
lady as means of thanking her for a letter which had 
reached its destination.^ When his courtiers kissed his 
hand, he was neither confused nor embarrassed, and if 

'Branzon's deposition before the examining magistrate Verdifere. 
^National Archives, BB" 979. 
'Blanchemain's deposition. 
*Libois' deposition. 

334 



ENQUIRIES 

one of his lady visitors threw herself on her knees, he 
would say, "Rise, Madam," in a tone of courtesy and sim- 
plicity which won hearts for him.-^ 

There was now an uninterrupted procession in Libois' 
cheap eating-house. Feasting and merrymaking con- 
tinued there day and night. Charles rose late, or, more 
strictly speaking, had no fixed hours ; but as soon as 
he was up the audiences began. People were no longer 
content to drink ; they must dine. It even happened that 
his adherents contrived a Good Friday to procure for 
the "King's" table a dish of green peas, a remarkable 
early vegetable, formerly the ceremonial viand on such 
a date in the days of Versailles.^ Charles supported 
his wine like a man whom excess does not frighten. How- 
ever, he was often drunk, either through lack of prudence 
or because his boon companions pressed him to drink 
in the hope of detecting his inmost thoughts. But he 
never contradicted himself and his theme never varied: in 
his confidences there ever returned the mention of a de- 
posit "made at the Tuileries by his father, Louis XVI, 
who had entrusted the secret to him and which he could 
find without difficulty, so fixed in his memory was the 
hiding place," allusions to a word of recognition agreed 
upon at the Temple between Madame Royale and himself, 
and by means of which he would remove the Princess' last 
doubts, and finally a mark which he bore above the left 
knee, a decisive proof in his opinion. He would agree, in 
advance, to the most ignominious death if his august 
sister rejected any one of these proofs of identity. These 
statements, affirmed with assurance, brought conviction 
to the minds of his listeners, who were eager to propagate 
them and recruit followers for this prince of cheap 
romance sheltered in the Norman Bicetre. Despite the 
silence maintained by the Government and the secrecy 

^Libois' deposition. 

^"The fact is true. I do not know who sent them but I believe 
it was the Lady Dumont. They were pickled green peas. All of 
us ate them and I did not find them good." Libois' deposition. 

335 



THE DAUPHIN 

with which it strove to surround this embarrassing ad- 
venture, the people of Rouen began to be concerned, al- 
though in those days they had the reputation of taking 
more interest in the fluctuations of prices on the Bourse 
than in the peripetias of a royal misfortune. 

People talked of Louis XVII in drawing rooms as well 
as in shops. Secret meetings brought together the com- 
mon people at the house of an old soldier named Joseph 
Paulin, who had had a diversified life and who pretended 
that he knew a good deal about the imprisonment in the 
Temple. Neuvaines were offer'ed up and pilgrimages 
organised to obtain the protection of Heaven for Charles. 
At the same time the "Society," without daring to de- 
clare itself openly, sent a few scouts to Bicetre. There 
were to be seen in Libois' tavern a retired officer named 
Pinel, a certain Dumets, ex-head clerk at the Prefecture, 
and Mme. Moine, a woman of action, very enterprising 
and most listened to.^ There called there people who 
had come specially from Elbeuf and Louviers, even from 
Vendee, such as Comtesse Doulcet de Meretz. The 
prisoner had to take a secretary, then a second and then 
a third. One of his fellow prisoners, Tourly, an ex- 
bailiff, condemned to ten years in irons, was entrusted 
with the correspondence and the signing of it, for Charles 
declared that he would write nothing in captivity; 
Griselle wrote the "Prince's" memoirs with the aid of por- 
tions borrowed from Regnault Warin*s romance, Le 
Cimetiere de la Madeleine; whilst Larcher, "a false 
priest," and swindler, made a specialty of proclamations 
intended "to convince the noble peers" and rally the 
army and the people. These pieces of eloquence were 
larded with Latin quotations such as gloria in excelsis 
Deo! . . . Ubi est Deus eornmi? and King Louis XVIII 
was called therein, without consideration, "an arrant usur- 
per" and "an audacious traitor." ^ When later, the ex- 

^Libois' examination. 

''J, de Saint-Leger, Louis XVII dit Charles de Navarre, pp. 134i-135. 

S36 



ENQUIRIES 

amining magistrate placed these documents under Charles* 
eyes, the latter read them with amusement, laughing until 
the tears rolled down his cheeks. "That old fool Pere 
Larcher," was, he declared, alone responsible for such 
charlatan tricks, which for his part he considered quite 
useless,^ and he was filled with indignation that they 
should have been stamped with his royal seal, the crowned 
beehive underneath which were three bees, a gun and a 
cannon crosswise, and, in the exergue, Louis XVII Charles 
de Bourbon, roi de France et d>0 Navarre par la grace 
de Dieu. 

Yes, Bicetre was a strange prison. Some uncommon 
ceremonies were sometimes witnessed there, such as the 
reception of Colonel Jacques-Charles de Foulques, who 
arrived from Falaise to offer his services to Charles and 
take an oath, with one hand on his heart and the other 
on the Gospel, "to be faithful to the son of the unfor- 
tunate Louis XVI." ^ He was immediately promoted 
ambassador and left for Paris, charged to hand to 
H.R.H. the Duchesse d'Angouleme a letter from "her 
brother the King" who, full of confidence, awaited a reply, 
whilst drinking hard and smoking his pipe. 

He may have thought himself, in fact, very near 
triumph if he judged by the emotion his pretensions 
caused. The magistracy appeared to be disarmed and 
for close upon the eighteen months he had carried on 
his intrigue he had not been examined a single time and 
had received no admonition. The Prefect, Comte de 
Kergariou, feigned ignorance of what was happening at 
Bicetre; whilst the police and the administration closed 
their eyes to the subversive feasts in Libois' and to the 
scenes enacted on the stage of his privileged eating- 
house. After Larcher's accidental death, Charles de 
Navarre appointed as the head of his civil household a 

*Larcher died the victim of a fire at Bicetre itself on the night of 
September 13, 1816. 

=J. C. de Foulques' deposition, sitting of February 14th, 1818, 
and Branzon's examination May 2nd, 1817. 

337 ' 



THE DAUPHIN 

certain Branzon, an ex-manager of the Rouen toll-house 
who was imprisoned for embezzlement. He was a clever 
man, with a knowledge of the world and of how to 
write. In the year VI he had been imprisoned in the 
Temple as an emigre. Although he denied, later, that 
he had done anything more than "put Charles' ideas into 
French," he gave the affair, in reality, a new course by 
elevating the tone of the correspondence and by ridding 
it of the vulgarities and clumsy boasting in which it 
had been dragged up to then. Immediately the imposture 
assumed the low water mark of dupes of quality. Charles' 
clientele had been composed of hardly any others than 
middle-class folk, country gentlemen and discontents of 
all sorts ; but henceforth it was to effect its ravages in 
the army and at Court, The first pilgrim of distinction 
who turned his steps towards Bicetre was Captain de la 
Paumeliere, of the third regiment of ^ the Guards, who 
was sent by his colonel "to see." La Paumeliere paid 
the prisoner two fairly long visits, ascertained "that he 
was well acquainted with the Vendee war, its incidents and 
actors," ^ and withdrew in a very agitated state of mind. 
The Marquis de Messy, major general and provost 
marshal of the Department of the Seine, informed of 
the result of this visit, applied to a Rouen lawyer, 
Maitre Poirel, in order to obtain further information. 
Poirel, in his turn, went to see the prisoner; entered the 
prison a doubter, and came out very disquieted. "Well- 
proportioned," he wrote to the Marquis de Messy, "Charles 
is about five feet three or four inches, and as to his 
physiognomy it takes more after the Austrians than the 
Bourbons. He has bright piercing eyes, an aquiline 
nose, and a prodigious local memory. Speaking English, 
Spanish, Italian, German and Russian, he pretends to 
speak French badly; but when he launches out he is not 
the same man : he speaks his language well. He claims that 
it was to him Bonaparte referred when he said: 'If I 
^National Archives, F' 6979. 

338 



ENQUIRIES 

vsdsh to disconcert all ambitions, I would make a man 
appear whose existence would astonish the Universe.' 
His character is severe. ... In familiar conversation he 
is caustic and a good observer. A few days ago, when 
Louis XVI's will was read to him, he burst into tears 
and withdrew to his room. . . ."^ 

The Marquis de Messy did not abstain from "circulat- 
ing copies of this letter among the public" and from 
sending officially the original to the Minister of Police, 
M. Decazes ; but already Charles de Navarre, feeling he 
was sailing before the wind, crowded all sail and forged 
ahead. On March 3rd he again addressed himself to his 
sister, the Duchesse d'Angouleme, sending her, through 
one of his adherents, a letter in Branzon's style, which, 
though somewhat affected and stiff, was polite and fairly 
touching. "It is the companion of your misfortunes, 
my sister, who writes to you again. . . . You inhabit the 
abode of honours and veneration ; your brother laments 
in the place destined for crime, destitute of everything 
and without any other consolation than that which comes 
from God. . . ." He then slipped in an allusion to the 
famous "word of recognition agreed between us twenty- 
two years ago . . . ," and finally declared that "he 
wished to pardon everybody" and "carry out the will 
of the most virtuous of monarchs to the letter." 

Did this letter reach the Duchesse d'Angouleme.? 

^This letter, as well as a second one addressed to the Duchesse 
d'Angouleme, is reproduced in full, in accordance with a report of 
the examining magistrate Verdi^re, in Etait-ce Louis XVII evadS 
du Temple? By Mme. J. de Saint-Leger, pp. 94 and following. 
(Perrin, Paris,) Under the pretext of reminding his sister of com- 
mon recollections, Charles calls up a few episodes of life in the 
Temple. He does not seem to have been very well informed regard- 
ing the captivity of the royal family. He pretends, for instance, 
that after his six months' sequestration the Dauphin and Madame 
Royale were reunited, which was not so. He also speaks of the de- 
posit made by Louis XVI in a hiding place of the Tuileries after 
August 10th, which is materially impossible. Moreover, all through 
his letters it is clear that Charles advanced with infinite precautions. 
If the real Dauphin had written to his sister, it would have been 
in quite a different tone, and he would have recalled to her cir- 
cumstances of the captivity more striking and more personal. 

339 



THE DAUPHIN 

Probably, although Charles' emissary did not succeed in 
gaining admission to the Princess. For the effect of the 
missive was not long in showing itself. On March 15th, 
Charles, informed by someone attached to his "secret 
police," dispatched the janitor and tavern keeper Libois, 
transformed for the occasion into an introducer of am- 
bassadors, to the Hotel de France to meet persons who 
had come from Paris and with whom he wished to con- 
verse. Libois carried out the errand and found at the 
Hotel "two gentlemen in plain clothes and without 
decorations" who asked him at what hour they could 
visit the supposed Dauphin of France, adding that they 
came on behalf of the Duchesse d'Angouleme.^ They 
immediately produced their passports. Upon one Libois 
read the name of the Comte de Montmaur, Captain of 
the Guards of Monsieur, the King's brother; the other 
traveller was the Due de Medini." ^ He guided them to 
the prison and introduced them into a little room of his 
apartment where Charles de Navarre was waiting. 
Everything passed off in a very proper manner. "You 
have come on behalf of my sister? Have you a letter 
from her?" asked the prisoner. The noblemen replied: 
"As a proof that we come on behalf of Madame, here is 
the letter you addressed to her." Charles took the letter 
and made a gesture as though to throw it into the fire; 
but he restrained himself and retained the paper, which 
he nervously rolled between his fingers. "Remain with 
me," he ordered Libois, and he proceded to ask the 
visitors to state their names and titles. To the Comte 
de Montmaur he remarked in a severe tone: "You are 
a Captain in my uncle's Guards. That is no recom- 
mendation to me, for he has never loved me !" However, 

*We are here following Libois' deposition before the examining 
magistrate. File of the Clerk of the Court of Rouen. Enquiry 
against Phelippeaux-Bruneau. 

^Or Midini? Libois confessed that he unfolded only M. de Mont- 
maur's passport, whose companion declared his name, which Libois 
did not remember correctly, for it would indeed seem that this "due 
de Medini" was no other than a M. Margerit. 

340 



ENQUIRIES 

he ordered a bottle of Madiera, a more distinguished 
beverage and one more fitted to the gravity of the occa- 
sion than the htre of piccolo -^ with which he was or- 
dinarily satisfied. Branzon, awaiting the moment when 
the bottle was uncorked, proceeded to verify the visitors' 
powers and examine the passports, and the conversation 
began.^ 

It lasted for an hour and a half. In the evening the 
two personages reappeared and this time remained nearly 
"three hours" with "the Prince." Libois, "who came and 
went," heard Comte de Montmaur state "that Madame 
had a secret presentiment of her brother's existence." 
The princess' envoys insisted on knowing "the mysterious 
word of recognition"; but Charles refused to tell it to 
them, as "the word must leave his lips only in his sister's 
presence." ^ The prisoner communicated to the two 
noblemen the Memoir de sa vie dictated by him to Tourly. 
They asked for authorization to take it to Madame, 
but it was refused. They then took their leave, passed 
the night at the Hotel de France, and the next morning 
left for Paris by the coach. 

This last detail sets one thinking. How is it that the 
envoys of so high and powerful a Princess, entrusted 
with an official mission and under such solemn circum- 
stances, had not at their disposal one of the post-chaises 
of the Court.? That the names on their passports may 
have been, if not imaginary, at least borrowed is probable ; 
but the title of "Captain of the Guards of Monsieur" 
could not be assumed with impunity. Must we see in 
these emissaries secret agencies of the police, hoaxers, 
or perhaps Charles' accomplices, audaciously assuming a 
part traced out for them in order to strengthen his 
credit, increase the number of his dupes and consolidate 
their faith.'' It is certain that that visit, quickly noised 

^An inferior wine of certain districts in France: e.g., Beaugency 
piccolo — Translator's note. 

^Libois' deposition. Archives of the Clerk of the Court of Rouen. 
^Examination of Branzon and Libois. 

341 



THE DAUPHIN^ 

abroad, had a considerable effect on the cause of the 
pseudo-Dauphin., A few days later the Comte de la 
Tour D'Auvergne, arrived from Paris, sent, it was said, 
by the Dowager Duchesse d'Orleans. He shut himself 
up with the prisoner from nine o'clock in the morning 
until evening. It was about this time also that the in- 
terview took place with Mme. de Tourzel, who had not 
been able to resist the desire to embrace her dear Prince.-^ 
She, also, remained a long time with Charles, and when 
Libois entered the room he saw her holding the prisoner 
in her arms. Both of them were in tears. ^ This was 
the most glorious period of Charles de Navarre's cap- 
tivity. Without having too many illusions, he may have 
believed himself to be on the eve of becoming King of 
France. He set to work to prepare himself for it and, 
wearing a uniform of the dragons and a helmet with a 
white feather,^ had several copies of his portrait painted 
in miniature. He even ordered the artist Guerard to 
prepare a stencil in order to add to the costume, when 
the time came, the blue ribbon of the Holy Spirit.^ He 
waited day after day for the Marquis de Brulard, who 
was to bring him 500,000 francs and "take steps to re- 
ceive him in Paris at the head of 50,000 men." ^ What 
reveries, plots and comedies were there at the base of 
this gossip? The affair was carried far, judging from a 
letter in which Charles, when sending one of his most 
enterprising devotees to Mme. Dumont, already expressed 
himself as a King. The same courier, he wrote, "will 
order the Minister on my behalf ... to carry out my 
intentions and send me at once the aide-de-camp I am 

*"He told me . . . that since his imprisonment at Bicetre he had 
seen several ladies, among others the Marquise de Tourzel, who, 
he said, had been his governess." Branzon's examination. 

^Although the fact has been attested by three witnesses and set 
down in the Memoires de la Bochefoucaiilt, Vol. V, p. 67, it re- 
mains open to suspicion, for there is no mention of it in Libois' 
deposition. 

^Examination of Libois and Halot, the doorkeeper's boy. 

^Examination of Guerard, artist, 5 Rue des Quatre-Vents. 

"Halot's deposition. 

342 



ENQUIRIES 

awaiting. And let care be taken that the letters for 
my two cousins and that for my sister be not delivered 
before I come out and that for my cousin, the Due de 
Bourbon, as soon as he arrives. . . ." ^ 

He left Bicetre escorted by troops, as he announced, but 
it was not to take him to the Tuileries. The Prefect 
of the Seine-Inferieure, learning that determined partisans 
planned to abduct the pretender,^ dispatched to the 
Bicetre prison on the night of April 29-30, 1817, a 
detachment of gendarmerie, commanded by a major. 
Charles was handed over to him by Libois and taken 
to the prison of the Palais de Justice and placed in 
secret confinement with an order "to allow only one 
turnkey, appointed for the duty, to approach him and to 
inform only the examining magistrates of his presence in 
prison." It was, perhaps, owing to this act of authority 
that the table of events in French history was saved from 
the anomaly of the statement that "Louis XVII suc- 
ceeded Louis XVIII," which would have been much to the 
fright of schoolboys of the future. 

This opportune suppression restored a little composure 
to the Government and justice. Comte Decazes showed 
himself, indeed, singularly hesitative and timid regarding 
the supposed Dauphin. His most ardent wish was that 
"the affair should not be noised abroad. He incessantly 
recommended prudence, circumspection, and hinted to 
the Prefect that, when forbidding all communication be- 
tween Charles de Navarre and his followers, "it was 
not necessary to display too much affectation and show." 
As to the magistrates, they had remained absolutely in- 
active during the fifteen months the scandal of Bicetre 
had lasted, waiting until chance gave them the oppor- 
tunity either to proceed against Libois' boarder or to 

^Archives of the Prefecture of Police. Bruneau file. 
^Letter from Comte Decazes to the Prefect and Archives of the 
Clerk of the Court of Rouen. 

343 



THE DAUPHIN 

shout "Long live the King," as he passed. Thej had 
hardly succeeded in those fifteen months, by means of 
Judicial commissions and enquiries among neighbouring 
prosecutors, in discovering the impostor's social state. 
Truth to tell, the police had showed so much zeal in the 
matter that it had succeeded in finding for M. Charles 
not merely one but two names. It was first of all estab- 
lished that he was Charles Mathurin Phelippeaux, bom 
in 1788 at Varennes-sous-Monsoreau, in Maine-et-Loire, 
where his mother was still living and kept a baker's shop 
attached to a little inn,^ 

The woman Phelippeaux was brought to Rouen. All 
in tears, she deposed that, Charles having stopped at her 
inn in September, 1815, she had indeed thought she had 
recognised him as her son, who had left as a conscript 
in 1807. But, all the same, she was not sure of it, for 
her Charles had not an aquiline nose like the Charles in 
prison, and she could not find on this man's foot the 
trace of a serious bum her boy had received when about 
ten years old. Upon the whole she remained perplexed 
and, notwithstanding the objurgations of the examining 
magistrate Verdiere, she did not show herself more affirm- 
ative. It became, indeed, necessary to be content with 
this fragile recognition and, failing something better, 
Charles de Navarre became officially Phelippeaux. But, 
one day in the summer of 1817, chance — a very mis- 
chievous chance — brought the Vicomtesse de Turpin de 
Crisse to Rouen. The very same lady who, in 1795, had 
charitably sheltered the pseudo-son of M. de Vesins at 
her Chateau of Angrie. M. de la Paumeliere, the Captain 
of the Royal Guard whose name we have mentioned, 
having gone to the hotel in the evening to greet her, 
spoke to her — -again by chance — of Charles Phelippeaux 
and the comments aroused by his long imprisonment. 

^Letter from the sub-prefect of Saumur. Archives of lUe et 
Vilaine. Phelippeaux file. Etait-ce Louis XVII ivad^ du Temple? 
P. 17 and following page. 

344 



ENQUIRIES 

Still by chance, the narrative recalled to Mme. de Turpin 
the more than twenty-year-old adventure of the little 
vagabond to whom she had given shelter in the days of 
the wars of the West. She related the story to M. de 
la Paumeliere, who, seized with a sudden inspiration and 
without losing a moment, went to the Prefect's in order 
to report to that functionary the presence in Rouen of a 
lady who, having formerly been the dupe of an impostor, 
^ould necessarily know how to penetrate the incognito 
of Charles de Navarre. Immediately full of ardour, the 
Prefect hastened to the hotel where Mme. de Turpin 
was stopping. She had already retired for the night, 
but he insisted on her getting up and listening to him. 
He begged her to come the next day to the Palais de Jus- 
tice, where they would confront her with the prisoner. She 
asked to be excused, on the plea that she must leave for 
Paris at four in the morning; but the Prefect insisted, 
pleading public interest, even that of the monarchy, so 
that Mme. de Turpin at last consented to retard her 
journey. Thus presented, the episode is hardly prob- 
able: it rests on coincidences and short cuts as acceptable 
in a rapid vaudeville as it is inadmissible in the always 
logical concatenation of realities. But we are here fol- 
lowing Mme. de Turpin's own narrative and she cer- 
tainly had her own reasons for concealing the motives 
of her visit to Rouen, those of M. de la Paumeliere's 
call, as well as those of the Prefect's apparently unjusti- 
fied eagerness. This is, indeed, one more enigma added to 
so many others. However that may be, Mme. de Turpin 
was received next morning at eight o'clock by the ex- 
amining magistrate, to whom she again related the Odys- 
sey of the supposed young nobleman who had formerly 
been brought to the Chateau of Angrie by the leaders 
of the royal army and whom they had recognised a year 
later to be only the son of a cobbler, Mathurin Bruneau. 
The magistrate then sent for Charles de Navarre, who 
showed himself ill-disposed. "Is this going to be an- 

345 



THE DAUPHIN 

other scene of a comedy? I am tired of all this," he at 
once declared. The magistrate was unmoved. "Phelip- 
peaux," he began. . . . "Phelippeaux ?" exclaimed the 
astonished Mme. de Turpin, who at the first glance had 
recognised, after twenty-two years, her guest of 1795. 
"Yes," replied Charles. "I have borne more than one 
name and I belong to many families." — "Do you know 
the Vicomtesse de Turpin?" continued the judge. — "Do 
I know her? Yes, certainly." — "Well, here she is." The 
prisoner looked at the visitor attentively. "No," he 
said, "she had more frizzy hair." — "I have changed a 
good deal," observed the lady. The examining magis- 
trate, who thought he was about to provoke a sensa- 
tional revelation: "Under what name did you come 
to the Chateau of Angrie in 1795?" — "Under the name 
of Baron de Vesins." — "Well, this is Madame de Turpin." 
The accused again looked at the Vicomtesse, endeavour- 
ing to fix his recollections. "If it is you," he asked, "how 
many daughters have you?" — "Two." — "Yes. What is 
the name of the elder?"— "Aglae."—" And the second?" 
— "Felecite." — "But you had someone else in your 
family at Angrie?" — "Charles de Turpin, my nephew, 
and now my son-in-law." "That is so," approved the 
accused, who, without embarrassment, continued his 
questions. "Who was it 'turned* on the pavilion?" — 
"Major de Fougeroux, whom you feared and hardly 
liked." And there were Charles and the Viscomtess re- 
calling former days in the presence of the magistrate, 
disconcerted at seeing the surprise on which he had 
counted turn into almost tender confidences. Mme. de 
Turpin considered it proper to conclude the conversation 
by a little good advice: "If you had profited by my 
lessons, you would not have been here or I either." — "I 
am here," replied Charles, "because the laws are bad and 
unjust, but I am going to change them. . . . And you 
will be the first to gain by it." — "Change them?" said the 
lady to the magistrate. "This poor man is insane." The 

346 



ENQUIRIES 

prisoner rose saying: "Since you are Mme. la Vicomtesse 
de Turpin, I wish you a very good morning." And he 
withdrew with dignity. 

The result of this interview was that henceforth he 
was Mathurin Bruneau. Judicial commissions were sent 
to Vesins and Viliers, where they found the cobbler's 
sisters, who consented, as Mere Phelippeaux had already 
done, to recognise the prisoner of Rouen as their brother 
Mathurin, who had disappeared many years before. 
Their conviction did not appear immovable. And the 
medley of the pretender's identification did not stop 
there. Soon it transpired that people recognised him to 
be Hervagault, who had been dead five years ! A lady 
named Jacquier, hearing the rumour that Louis XVII 
was pining in Normandy prisons, came to Rouen and 
certified that the Dauphin Bruneau was the one she had 
known at Vitry, who had been declared by Mgr. Lafont 
de Savine to be the only true Dauphin.^ Even this was 
surpassed. Chance, which really took a great deal of 
trouble, also brought to Rouen the assistant surgeon 
Robert, who had formerly been Hervagault's bosom 
friend on board the Cyhele in 1809. Robert sauntered 
into the refreshment room of the Palais de Justice and, 
after having carefully examined Charles de Navarre — 
Phelippeaux — Bruneau certified that *7^^ was the same 
main!" The magistrates were astounded and all the more 
so as the assistant surgeon denied that he was to be 

counted among the "disciples." M. M. , after 

enquiry, saw in him, on the contrary, "only a man in- 
finitely wise and very devoted to the Government." ^ 

M. M. was the deus ex machind sent by the 

Minister Decazes to lead the imbroglio towards a happy 
and discreet conclusion. It had been suggested to Charles 
that he would do well to have the assistance of a lawyer, 

^Archives of the Prefecture of Police. Bruneau file. 
"National Archives, F' 6979, document 115. Etait-oe Louis XVII 
By J. de Saint-Leger. 

347 



THE DAUPHIN 

and whilst his followers were looking for someone a 
Parisian jurist-consult came forward and offered to de- 
vote his whole zeal to the cause of the unrecognised 
prisoner. He was accepted with gratitude. This lawyer 

was M. M. , known on the judicial press 

through the publication of a copious collection of causes 

celehres. Now, M. M. was no other than a spy 

sent to the Pretender by the Government, the lawyer be- 
ing thus in a position to collect every secret, not only 
from the accused but from his followers, to obtain their 
confidence by underhand manceuvres, to facilitate and to 
intercept their correspondence, to lavish advice harmful 
to his client's cause, to watch over the magistrates and 
report to the Minister all those who showed either in- 
terest or curiosity in Charles de Navarre. This person 
was evidently absolutely unscrupulous. He performed 
his repugnant duty zealously, for the Archives preserve 
the almost daily reports he sent from Rouen to the 
Minister. But what are we to think of the Government 
which used such means, and have we not here an evident 
proof of the fears of Louis XVIII.'' 



What they wished above all to prevent was any con- 
nection between the Duchesse d'Angouleme and the 
prisoner of Rouen. The Princess' self-willed and in- 
flexible character being known, they knew that if ever a 
certainty of her brother's survival took root in her mind, 
no power, not even that of the State, would force her 
to keep silent. 

People "who know everything" have not hesitated to 
condemn the daughter of Louis XVI, convicted, accord- 
ing to them, of having disowned her brother who she 
knew was living, in order not to compromise the rights 
of her husband to the crown of France. She has even 
been nicknamed Duchess Cain. But that is the coarse 

348 



ENQUIRIES 

method of a writer of cheap romance; the study of so 
delicate a problem demands more subtlety and considera- 
tion. No psychology remains more impenetrable than 
that of the orphan of the Temple and the shocks she 
received during her life explain the stiffness and apparent 
hardness of her character. To her who, from the age of 
reason, after the happiest and most adulated childhood, 
was compelled to affect attitudes ; who lived surrounded 
by hostile jailors, who passed the perilous age of trans- 
formation in frightened solitude, who knew naught save 
mourning, coercion, mysteries, hatreds, rebuffs and lies, 
to this one it is permissible not to be "like others'* and 
to arm with irreducible distrust her heart which had not 
flowered. 

What did Madame Royale know personally concern- 
ing her brother's fate.'* Nothing but what she has set 
down in her journal of the Temple. On the day of 
Simon's departure she believed the Dauphin had left 
the Tower and her conviction was strengthened by the 
silence which reigned after that time on the second story 
of the prison. During seventeen months she heard not 
a word about the little Prince; and even when the 
presence of Laurent, Gomin and Lasne mitigated her 
captivity they replied to her quickly discouraged ques- 
tions merely by evasions. It appears improbable that 
from the 8th to the 10th of June, 1795, she did not 
perceive any of the unusual movements caused in the 
sonorous Tower by the death and autopsy of the captive 
child, by the procession of soldiers admitted to "recog- 
nise" the body, by the visit of the members of the Con- 
vention, who, as already pointed out, abstained, contrary 
to practice, to ascend to her apartment. We are aston- 
ished that she guessed nothing from the discomposed 
faces of Gomin and Lasne, who would have had to have 
been exceedingly clever actors to have revealed nothing 
of that anxiety and sorrow which — Plater — they pre- 

349 



THE DAUPHIN 

tended they experienced/ How is it that she had no 
suspicion of the truth when, on June 20th, Mme. Chan- 
tereine, the amiable lady's companion provided for her 
by the Committee of General Safety, arrived, when her 
cell was at last opened, when she was able to descend to 
the garden according to her fancy, or move about in all 
the apartments of the two Towers, when she learnt that 
linen, dresses and books were placed at her disposal, 
when she noticed the suppression of the civic commis- 
sioners and the reduction of the guard to fifteen men, 
when finally she saw that the whole of the suddenly 
dispelled nightmare, isolation, soldiers, jailors, bolts, 
cannons and so many regulations, guardians, precautions, 
mysteries and cruelty had had, for a year and a half, 
but one object: the sequestration of a poor child of ten, 
whose face she must not see or whose voice she must not 
hear? She must, then, have made enquiries as to her 
brother's fate she could have insisted on precise details. 
They even told her, as the date of the death, that of the 
autopsy, as had been done in the case of the whole of 
the prison staff.^ But it is again very surprising that 
we do know and that she did not say who undertook to 
inform her of it and what precautions were taken, if not 
to spare her sensibility at least to prevent her being 
astonished that she had not been informed sooner and 
summoned to be present during the last moments of the 
little dying boy so dear to her heart. Only Gomin or 
Lasne was qualified to inform her of the circumstances 

^One cannot understand, when reading Beauchesne's touching nar- 
ratives, how it is that Gomin, shutting himself up to weep over the 
royal child he loved so much, did not burst into tears when, on the 
day of the death, on the day of the autopsy, and on the day of 
the funeral, he was in the presence of Marie Therese, to whom he 
was able to say nothing of what was happening on the lower floor. 
If, during those three days, he avoided ascending to the prisoner's 
apartment, how is it that that unusual abstention did not awaken 
the Princess' anxiety, and if he dared to visit her three times a day, 
how is it that she did not detect anguish and sadness on the face of 
her most attentive jailor? 

'Madame Royale writes in fact in her diary "he expired without 
agony on the 9th of June. . . ." 

350 



ENQUIRIES 

set down in her diary; therefore it was through one or 
the other she became acquainted with her recent loss. 
Mme. Chantereine knew nothing except by hearsay, but 
doubtless she had received orders and must have con- 
firmed the story of the two jailors when talking to the 
orphan princess. We must admit that Madame Royale 
placed faith in it. However, it was not long before sus- 
picion arose in her mind, for as soon as the Temple doors 
were thrown open the lady visitors she received and in 
whom she had every confidence were convinced that the 
Dauphin was not dead and must necessarily have sug- 
gested consolatory hopes to the young Princess. 

Among the visitors were Mme. de Tourzel and her 
daughter, Pauline, both of whom had lived a few days 
at the Temple at the beginning of the captivity. To 
reject the authority of Mme. de Tourzel and suggest that 
she did not believe in the young Prince's death when she 
herself in her Memoirs writes "that she possesses the 
certainty of it and cannot conceive the slightest doubt" 
is a very delicate matter. Had she already that cer- 
tainty when she came to the Temple in September, 1795, 
to greet Madame Royale? The latter asked her to 
peruse the pages of the registers of the council room, 
and the Marquise de Tourzel read therein "the whole 
progress of the young King's illness, the details of his last 
moments and even those concerning his burial." That 
is to say, she took cognisance precisely of those pages 
of the diary referring to June 8th, 9th and 10th, 1795, 
the only ones of which a copy has been preserved and 
which, contain, in fact, a minutely set down account of 
the grim comedy the death of the little prisoner occa- 
sioned, the hastily-made autopsy and the feigned recog- 
nition. If this document served as the basis of the 
noble lady's conviction, it was because she failed to see 
what it contained; it stated that a child had died in 
the Temple, but in almost every line it implicitly testi- 

351 



THE DAUPHIN 

fied that that child was not the Dauphin.-^ The agitated 
attention of the Marquise was directed to the circum- 
stances of the death and not to the flagrant juggling 
regarding the identity of the deceased. Gomin, who knew 
this report full well and who was aware of its redoubtable 
omissions, surprised Mme. de Tourzel in the act of read- 
ing it. "He flew into a violent passion, reproached me 
very bitterly for the imprudence of my conduct and 
threatened to lay a complaint." ^ Madame Royale had 
to intervene to calm Gomin's alarm. "Fear of com- 
promising himself made him lose his head," wrote Mme. 
de Tourzel. 

As to the young princess, this strange scene cannot 
have contributed to strengthen her belief in her brother's 
death. In relating these interviews of the Temple in 
her Souvenirs de quarante ans, Pauline de Tourzel strives 
to understand it and on several occasions, when enumerat- 
ing the sorrows which had afflicted the Princess, she 
aff'ects to pass over the name of the Dauphin in silence. 
"Madame was alone," she says. "The King, Queen, 
Madame Elizabeth, all had perished around her, all had 
disappeared." — "Were we destined to inform her that, 
after having lost her father, she had also lost her mother 
and Madame Elizabeth.'' . . ." Nobody else; and one 
must not omit to point out that, the day after one of 
these conversations with Mme. and Mile, de Tourzel, the 
daughter of Louis XVI wrote to her uncle the following 
famous letter, a faithful echo of her conversation and 
which has been so much critised: "It is she whose 
father, mother and aunt they killed who implores you, on 
her knees, on behalf of the French people, for mercy and 
peace." 

As Pauline's granddaughter, Mme. Blanche de Beam, 
the nun Sister Vincent, affirms, that her grandmother "was 
quite convinced of the escape of Louis XVII, removed 

^See the analysis of this document on p. 250 and following pages. 
^Tourzel. 

352 



ENQUIRIES 

from the Temple and replaced by another child"; as she 
also declares that her grandfather and father never be- 
lieved in the Dauphin's death ;^ as, on the other hand, she 
assures us that Madame Royale always sought for her 
brother "since, a few weeks before her death, she again 
wrote to the Comte de Beam to discuss this serious ques- 
tion, which she had so much at heart" ;^ as, finally, in the 
preface to the Mevioirs of Mme. de Tourzel, the Marquis 
de la Ferronnays — evidently well informed — writes: 
"Mme. la Dauphine for many years retained the hope of 
finding her brother," it remains established that if, in 
1795, the former governess of the children of the King 
of France was really convinced of the death in the Temple, 
she was the only one of all her people to hold that opinion 
and that the sister of Louis XVII did not share it. 

No one need be astonished that she did not confess her 
doubts to anybody and, that, having become Dauphine of 
France by her marriage with the Due d'Angouleme, she 
had to hide them with still greater reserve; but they sub- 
sisted in her mind for a very long time, as is proved by 
facts. We have seen that she was interested in the ac- 
count of Hervagault's adventures, of which she was in- 
formed by Pere de Lestrange, the abbot of La Trappe. 
When, in 1816, Charles de Navarre sprang into notice, 
Madame's perplexity still endured: she let that be seen 
when she permitted a list of questions to be sent to the 
Pretender of Rouen with the object of discovering, ac- 
cording to the veracity of the replies, "if he was really 
the Dauphin." This list of questions was drawn up by 
Turgy,^ the ex-waiter, who, having followed Madame to 
Basle, to Austria, Courland, and to England, had become 
since the Restoration, the Chevalier de Turgy, first valet 
de chambre to Madame la Dauphine, usher of her boudoir 

^Declaration of Sister Vincent, granddaughter of the Comtesse de 
B6arn, n^e Pauline de Tourzel. La Revue de Paris, September 1st, 
1904. L'evasion de Louis XVII by H. de Granvelle. 

*The same. 

Journal des D4bats, May 29th, 1817, p. 2. 

353 



THE DAUPHIN 

and officier of the legion of honour. Now, as the holder of 
this eminently confidential post, he would not have run the 
risk of so compromising a step without the order or at 
least the authorisation of the Princess. These questions, 
put in the form of riddles, refer to certain details of the 
private life in the prison in the days when brother and 
sister were still with the Queen and Madame Elizabeth.^ 

They did not reach Charles de Navarre, since M. M., 

the lawyer-spy intercepted them and sent them, with his 
daily report, to the Minister of Police, who classified them 
in his file, where we find them. A fresh proof that the 
Government of the Restoration feared the noising abroad 
of the "Louis XVII affair" still more than they hoped for 
the confusion of the prisoner of Rouen. 

The object of all its efforts was to prevent anything 
being said either about the sequestration or about the 
death of the little captive in the Temple, or about those 
who may have been witnesses of it, or about anything 
concerning the circumstances of the captivity. When, 
mider pressure of public opinion, an inquiry had to be 
undertaken, it was with the manifest desire that it should 
lead to nothing. They decided to study the question of 
the burial — by far the least dangerous, for they were sure 
that the soil of the Sainte Marguerite cemetery would re- 
tain its secret. What likelihood was there of finding and 
identifying the remains of the predecessor of Louis XVIII 
among the bones with which this saturated soil abounded, 

^"Questions asked by a person who was placed near Madame and 
who, during the sojourn in the Temple, says that he was entrusted 
with the correspondence: — 1. What happened on January 21st when 
the firing of cannon was heard? What did your aunt say then and 
what did they do for you out of the ordinary? — 2. Where did you 
gather together my correspondence? In what room? — 3. What did you 
do to me on New Year's Day and how, in what room? — 4. What was 
your means of amusement? What did you do with soapy water? — 
5. What did Simon entrust you to hand to me and which you gave 
me one day when I was cutting your hair? 6. What did you say 
one day to your mother when speaking of Marchand, the waiter, and 
beginning with the words, 'Mamma, the window is open'? — 7. Where 
were Les Droits de I'homme placed, in what room?" National 
Archives F' 6979. 

354< 



ENQUIRIES 

this burial place since 1652 and which, from the time of 
the Revolution until the year XII, had received in its com- 
mon grave the bodies of a quarter of the capital and of 
nine prisons or hospitals?^ 

To the almost threatening apostrophe of Chauteau- 
briand who, from the Tribune of the Chamber of Peers, 
demanded, on January 9th, 1816: "What has become of 
that Royal ward left under the tutelage of the executioner, 
that orphan who might say, like David's heir: "My 
father and my mother have abandoned me?" Where is 
the companion of those afflictions, the brother of the 
orphan girl of the Temple? Where can I address to him 
this terrible and too well-known question : Capet, dost 
thou sleep? . . ." the Government understood it was high 
time to reply. From the very first enquiry the problem 
was seen to be insoluble. They questioned Voisin, the 
man who directed the funeral in 1795, and, taking him out 
of Bicetre where he was an inmate, got him to indicate 
within the cemetery enclosure the site of a grave he had 
dug himself and in which he stated he had placed the 
Dauphin's coffin, which he had marked "at the top and 
bottom with a D traced in charcoal."^ After Voisin, 
Bureau appeared. Doorkeeper of the cemetery for 
twenty-eight years past, he testified that no special grave 
had been dug, but that the Dauphin's coffin was put in its 

^Lucien Lambeau. The Cimetibre Sainte Marguerite. 

^Voisin's deposition contains certain details which may not be 
without interest. "He placed," he says, "the coflBn in a private grave 
which he himself had dug specially in the morning — a grave at least 
six feet in depth. . . . The only ones who entered the cemetery were 
the soldiers, Dusser, some members of the Charity Board and the> 
civic commissioners of the Temple section. . . . The coflSn was about 
five feet long, the young monarch being tall for his age. Voisin 
himself filled in the grave with earth. He carefully closed the 
cemetery door and afterwards went to see (on the following days) 
if the earth had been touched, but he saw nothing altered. . . . They 
used the cemetery for about five weeks longer and during that time 
he dug only a few private graves, but at a distance of about six 
feet from that of the young king. . . . The individuals of the same 
age whom he buried at the same time in separate graves were all 
of the feminine sex, as far as he was able to recollect. . . . Archives 
of the Prefecture of Police. 

355 



THE DAUPHIN 

proper place in the common grave. Dusser, the ex-com- 
missary of Police of the Temple section who presided over 
the burial, questioned in his turn/ affirmed that "the 
young and interesting victim" was buried in a separate 
grave and that "the most severe measures were proposed 
against him, Dusser, through him not having been able 
to hide under these circumstances his pure Royalist senti- 
ments." The sycophantic tone of all these former 
Brutuses was disgustingly platitudinous : they bethought 
themselves, since the return of the Bourbons, that little 
Capet had not merited his fate and, in speaking of him, 
they competed with each other as to who could weep the 
most! 

Dusser having been heard, they sought for Betrancourt, 
the grave-digger, only to learn that he was dead. But 
his widow was still living and her deposition was interest- 
ing. She related that, on June 11th, 1795, early in the 
morning, as she was hanging out her washing in the 
cemetery, her man, working at the "trench" — the com- 
mon grave — called out to her and invited her to come 
down into the hole. When she had slipped into it, 
Betrancourt, "thrusting his spade into several places," 
pointed out to her "that there was nothing underneath." 
As the woman complained at his having disturbed her for 
so little, he said: "Well, you are not very curious. You 
don't even ask what has become of the coffin?" There- 
upon he declared that she would never be anything else 
but a stupid and whilst she was continuing to hang up her 
washing, she saw him, at a distance, "continue to cross his 
arms, leaning on his spade in the attitude of one who is 
thinking." Shortly afterwards, however, he confided to 
her that, on the very night following the interment, he had 
withdrawn the Dauphin's coffin from the trench and buried 

^Dusser, completely paralysed in 1816, could not go to Sainte 
Marguerite and had to dictate his testimony. The original of his 
deposition is at the Archives of the Prefecture of Police. 

356 



ENQUIRIES 

it "in a grave dug against the foundations of the Church 
under the door of the left transept." ^ 

The enquiry of M. Decazes* agents were, then, face 
to face with four versions : the common grave, the spot 
pointed out by Voisin, the one indicated by Dusser, and 
the clandestine translation operated by Betrancourt. A 
fifth was made known by Toussaint Charpentier, head 
gardener of the Luxembourg, declaring that, three days 
after the burial at Sainte-Marguerite, the coffin of the 
royal child had been transported to the Clamart cemetery 
and interred, he being a witness, in the presence of a few 
members of the Committee of the section.^ And there 
were still other versions. One is given in a little note, 
without either date or signature, preserved in the file of 
the National Archives and certifying that the excavations 
undertaken at the Sainte Marguerite cemetery resulted in 
the discovery of a "broken stone and a lead box contain- 
ing papers which were handed to the Minister of Police." ^ 
Another, which does not appear to have been known to 
those making the enquiry of 1816, comes from General 
Comte d'Andigne. A prisoner at the Temple in 1801, he had 
amused himself with some of his companions in captivity 
in digging the prison garden, with the result that their 
space uncovered the skeleton "of a big child who had been 
buried in quicklime." The bones were respectfully cov- 
ered up again; but Fauconnier, the doorkeeper of the 
Temple at that time being present at that fortuitous ex- 
humation, d'Andigne said to him: "This is evidently the 
body of Monseigneur le Dauphin?" Fauconnier "ap- 
peared somewhat embarrassed but replied without hesita- 
tion : 'Yes, sir.' '* 

^Widow Betrancourt, specifies as follows: "Her husband dug a 
separate grave, near the door of the communion, along the wall of 
the church and perpendicularly to the said wall. The grave stretched 
as much outside as in the wall and in its thickness, in such a man- 
ner as to be able to get half the coffin therein." Archives of the 
Prefecture of Police. 

^Charpentier's declaration has been published by Peuchet. 
M ^moires de tons. Vol. II, p. 344. 

^National Archives, F' 1496. 

367 



THE DAUPHIN 

The question, as we see, was sufficiently difficult to jus- 
tify renunciation and that was the decision to which 
Louis XVin came. On the day fixed for the exhuma- 
tion, the whole of the clergy of Sainte-Marguerite, headed 
by M. le Cure Dubois, with albs, surplices, stoles and choir 
boys carrying the cross, were awaiting the delegate of the 
Minister of Police when an envoy of the Prefect appeared 
and announced "that there was reason for postponing 
the operation." It was resumed many years later, as we 
shall see, and only then did people understand why the 
Government of the Restoration had shown so little insist- 
ence in excavating that ground where they manifestly 
knew they would not find bones worthy to occupy, with- 
out usurpation, a place in the vaults of St. Denis. The 
grave diggers had disputed over the body of the child of 
the Temple as political parties had disputed over his per- 
son and royalty; and these clandestine rivalries had lead 
the little dead boy to the same slough of intrigues and mys- 
teries in which the living boy had sunk. 



The failure of this first enquiry did not abolish doubts 
and did not calm the emotion caused by the appearance 
of the pretended son of Louis XVI. Since they had not 
found the Dauphin's body, as they had found those of 
his father and mother, he was, therefore, still living. 
Such was the opinion of simple-minded folk, and from all 
parts of France devoted Royalists, who knew or thought 
they knew something concerning the Prince's escape, imag- 
ined, by revealing it, they were making themselves agree- 
able to the Government and strove with the best faith in 
the world to prove to Louis XVIII that he was a usurper. 
One could fill a volume with the declarations with which 
the pigeon-holes of the Ministry were stuffed about that 
time. Faced by this threatening schism, the Government 
showed itself supremely skilful; it took the direction of 

358 




THE CEMETERY OF SAINTE-MARGUERITE. HOUSE OF 
THE GRAVE-DIGGER 

From the Bulletin de la Commission Municipale du Vieux Paris 



ENQUIRIES 

the movement and, in order to stifle it, encouraged it. 
On April 2nd, 1817, Decazes dictated a note to officers 
of the peace requesting them to collect "the names and 
present profession of persons who had formerly shown 
interest in and been attentive to the son of Louis XVI 
during his captivity, notably Laurent, Gomin, Loine 
(Lasne), Drs. Dumangin, Thierry, Soupe Jupales (Pipe- 
let?), and the doorkeeper of the Temple, "whose name 
is unknown, three municipal officers and two commission- 
ers who treated the Dauphin well and whose names are 
also unknown." The municipal police magistrates imme- 
diately set to work to hunt, but of all the persons men- 
tioned or indicated in the Minister's note, how many do 
you think were interrogated? Not a single one! Laurent, 
it is true, was dead; but it was easy to find Lasne and 
Gomin, and they took good care not to question them. 
They learnt that Dr. Dumangin lived in retirement at 
St. Prix, yet they considered it more prudent not to 
awaken the recollections of this practitioner. On the 
other hand, without looking for them, they found Dr. Pel- 
letan and the commissioner Damont. 

We have not, perhaps, forgotten that it was Pelletan 
who, at the conclusion of the autopsy, wrapped the heart 
taken from the little corpse in a napkin. He carefully 
preserved it. The return of the Bourbons raised this 
viscus from the rank of an anatomical specimen to that of 
a relic, which was so much the more precious as it was 
the only authentic remains of the body of Louis XVII. 
Pelletan offered it to Louis XVIII. And Louis XVIII 
refused it! Pelletan insisted, addressing himself to the 
Duchesse d'Angouleme, who neglected to reply. An in- 
quiry, conducted by M. Pasquier, proved the authenticity 
of the heart ; but all the same the Bourbons refused to ac- 
cept it. Their behaviour was brutal ; the word of honour 
of a man of the importance of "Chevalier Pelletan," an 
eminent savant, a member of the Royal Academy of Sci- 
ences and professor at the Faculty of Medicine of Paris, 

359 



THE DAUPHIN 

Knight of the Royal Order of the Legion of Honour, was 
worthy indeed of being taken into consideration.-^ Was 
Pelletan, tainted with Bonapartism, in bad odour, as was 
said, at the Court? ^ Maybe; but what about Damont, 

^This question of Louis XVI I's heart has occasioned numerous 
polemics, which have been summed up in a letter from Dr. Arnaud 
of Aries, published in the Revolution frangaise of October 14th, 
1882. An attempt has been made to justify the behaviour of the 
Court, either by the distrust the political past of the great surgeon 
may have inspired or by his spontaneous confession that the heart 
had remained for a certain time at the house of one of his house- 
pupils. This heart, preserved by Pelletan and deposited after his 
death in the Archives of a Parisian notary, was accepted in 1895 
by Don Carlos and is probably to be found to-day at the Chateau 
of Frohsdorff. 

'Quite an arbitrary supposition, however. The file of the Prefec- 
ture of Police contains two autograph letters from Pelletan which, 
unless I am mistaken, must have so far escaped the notice of search- 
ers into this question. Pelletan relates how, from the first day of the 
Restoration in 1814 and even before the King's arrival, he informed 
M. Francois d'Escars (sic) that he possessed the heart of Louis 
XVII. When Louis XVIII was installed at the Tuileries M. 
Descars (sic) "was of opinion that it was to him, in preference, that 
the thing ought to be presented." Pelletan received the advice to 
call upon M. de Blacas and paid him twelve to fifteen fruitless 
visits. — "I rarely found him," writes Pelletan. "He was always 
in a hurry. I received from him but the testimony of his remem- 
brance and of the difficulty of finding a favourable moment to 
speak to the King on such a subject. ... In the meantime, the 
Duchesse d'Angouleme came to visit the Hotel Dieu and I had the 
honour to be presented to her by the administrators as the head 
surgeon of that hospital. Her Royal Highness deigned to approach 
me and kindly told me that she had known me since former days. 
She asked me if, in reality, I had attended her brother and if it 
was true that I could recognise his body by the section of the skull 
I had made. I replied in the affirmative and Her Royal Highness 
moved away from me. The next day I received a letter from the 
Due d'Havre, who informed me that Her Royal Highness desired 
to receive me on the following day. I was received with kindness. 
Her Highness deigned to thank me for the care I had given her 
sick brother and enquired into the means I had employed to ab- 
stract the heart. . . . She spoke to me of its theft and restitution, 
kindly adding that, apart from the confidence I merited, this 
incident was a proof that there was no mistake about the object 
in question. She reiterated her most flattering thanks and told me 
that she would speak about it to the King." But, sent from the 
Vicomte de Montmorency to the Grand Almoner, from the Grand 
Almoner to the Abb6 de Quelen, and then to Chateaubriand, who 
came to see the heart at Pelletan's house, the surgeon never suc- 
ceeded in being received by the King and was justly astonished not 
to be among the commissioners chosen to be present at the ex- 
humation — "nobody," he adds, "being more capable than myself of 
recognising the precious remains. Nothing but an intrigue could 

360 



ENQUIRIES 

candid Damont, the commissioner of the Faubourg du 
Nord Section on duty at the Temple on June 5th, 1795, 
who, at the end of the autopsy, took and carried away 
the hair cut from the body? The pohce notes were ex- 
tremely favourable to him. He was seventy-two years 
of age, a member of the charity committee of his quarter, 
and the lock of hair he had appropriated had never left 
his residence; it was still enclosed in the fragment of 
newspaper in which he had wrapped it on the very day of 
his pious larceny, and he had made for it a reliquary in 
white velvet, figured with golden fleur de lys, itself en- 
closed in a red morocco case with lock and key and bear- 
ing this inscription: "Hair of His Majesty Louis XVII, 
preserved by Mr. Damont. . . ." No relic presented 
more marks of absolute authenticity than this one — if it 
was the Dauphin who died in the Temple. From 1815 
Damont was engaged in earnest entreaties to be allowed 
to present it to the Duchesse d'Angouleme. Though cor- 
dially received by the Due d^Avaray, "he had been unable 
to obtain an audience with Madame, who certainly showed 
little eagerness in receiving souvenirs of her brother. Not 
until July, 1817, after applications lasting two years, 
was Damont received by the Due de Gramont, Captain 
of the body guard. He proceeded to the Tuileries carry- 
ing his reliquary, was received at the Pavilion de Flore, 
and admitted to the presence of M. de Gramont, who, 
opening the box, examined the hair and declared "that 
it was not the Dauphin's hair, the boy's curls being much 
lighter. He had had the opportunity of knowing that 
fact well, since his mother-in-law had been governess to 
the children of the King of France." Whereupon the 
Duke "rang for his breakfast" and Damont, carrying 
away his box, left the Tuileries dismayed. He could not 
understand how it was that a lock of hair which, with his 

have diverted the result of my steps. I abstain from denouncing 
it openly and shall content myself with the contempt it ought to 
inspire, in the hope that, at last, the truth will succeed in becoming 
known." Archives of the Prefecture of Police. 

S61 



THE DAUPHIN 

own eyes, he had seen cut from the Dauphin's head, could 
belong to another child. ^ He had the explanation of 
this riddle a few days later. Telling his brother-in-law 
Roussiale of his discomfiture, the latter "pointed out to 
him that the hair might indeed be that of the child who 
died in the Temple" and "that the child he, Damont, had 
seen was a substituted child . . ." an idea which had 
never occurred to Damont and which he indignantly re- 
jected.^ 

Thus, of all the persons who were at the Temple from 
the 8th to the 10th of June, 1795, only two, Pelletan and 
Damont, showed in a tangible manner, their belief in the 
Royal personality of the deceased. The family of the 
Bourbons strove to destroy their illusions and the Gov- 
ernment, in like manner, ousted the zealous persons who 
flattered themselves that they could elucidate the riddle 
of the Temple. After having officially appealed, not only 
to the individuals whose names had been reported to it 
but also to "all those who might be discovered," it im- 
posed silence on the witnesses who came forward. Two 
examples will suffice to show the manner in which this 
was done. The mason Barelle — that member of the Com- 
mune who had taken a liking to the Dauphin, who called 
him "his good friend" — was still living in 1817. Hearing 
that they were preparing to try a pretended son of Louis 
XVI, he appealed to the Rouen magistrates and took 
the liberty of pointing out to them "that they had not 
gone to the fountain head to enlighten their understand- 
ing in a procedure which absorbed all minds." — "Eye- 
witnesses, municipal officers who accompanied the Dauphin 
until the 11th of Thermidor exist," he wrote. . . . 
"Their confrontation might throw some light on so deli- 

Wational Archives, F' 6808. 

^Damont's direct descent was perpetuated to the present day. It 
was represented, a few years ago, by Louis Victor Damont, born 
on November 15, 1840, and by August Antoine Damont born on 
September 9th, 1851, at Belleville. It would be interesting to know 
whether the little box ornamented with fleur de lys has been pre- 
served in the family of the Commissioner of the Temple. 

362 



ENQUIRIES 

cate a subject" . . . and their deposition "would be 
more sure and more veracious than the various narratives 
which each writes after his own fashion. . . .'* The 
opinion was judicious; Barelle had certainly something to 
relate. Decazes rejected the proposal, under the pretext 
that such a letter "resembled more a demand for assist- 
ance than a sincere offer of testimony." ^ 

He also refused the very romantic attestation of a 
woman named Fran9oise Desperez, a peasant of the Ven- 
dee who, in the days of "the great war," served as an 
agent between the various leaders of the insurrection. 
She had been entrusted with important missions by 
Charette, Scepeaux, Trotte and others, who had often 
sent her to Paris. Since the return of the Bourbons, 
she had settled down in the capital and was living at the 
Hotel des Trois Maillets, in the Rue Montorgeuil, on a 
pension granted her by the King as a reward for her 
services.^ Now, this old chouarme related to anyone 
who would listen to her that, on the occasion of one of 
her journeys to Paris, in June, 1795, one of the Royalist 
leaders made an appointment with her "at the comer of a 
street not far from the Temple." Waiting there was 
a carriage, onto which she mounted, and shortly after- 
wards "they brought her the Dauphin, whom she imme- 
diately dressed as a girl and took to Fontenai, where she 
handed him to Charette. . . ." This version is a little 
too similar to that of the romance Le Cimetiere de la 
Madeleine to permit us to accept it, without possible con- 
trol, seriously. What astonishes one is the tone of sin- 
cerity with which the good woman related the adventure. 
She produced an impression even on the police agents 
charged to impose silence on her.^ The Vendeenne, not- 

^National Archives, BB^» 979. 

'In 1817 Francois Desprez was more than sixty years of age. 
The narrative of her warlike exploits had been printed in a rather 
insignificant pamphlet, a copy of which is in the Bibliotheque 
Nationale. 

*"This spinster's narrative seems worthy of the greatest interest 
and the natural simplicity with which she adds a multitude of de- 

363 



THE DAUPHIN 

withstanding threats, undertook the journey to Rouen, 
was followed there by Decazes' police, but nevertheless 
put herself in relations with the followers. But she did 
not succeed, it is believed, in entering into communication 
with the Pretender. They made a search at her house 
and she was sent far out of the town under strict super- 
vision. These blunders on the part of the authorities 
produced an effect absolutely contrary to the result an- 
ticipated, and in relating them a determined opponent 
of the thesis of an escape wrote: "Does Louis XVIII, 
then, believe it possible that the Royal descendant was 
snatched from prison? It is certain that he acts as 
though he believed it." 

Rid of the woman Desprez, Decazes came up against a 
much more redoubtable obstacle. On June 7th, 1816, a 
secret agent submitted to His Excellency "the idea of see- 
ing at the Hospital ctes Petites Maisons if the wife of 
the infamous Simon still existed. . . . This woman went 
to the Temple incessantly, and was in a position to see and 
hear everything." The agent was wrong on one point. 
The woman Simon, being a widow, could never have been 
an inmate of the Petites Maisons, an establishment re- 
served for old couples; it was at the Incurables that she 
had been in hospital for the past twenty years. After 
the 9th of Thermidor, her husband having died on the 
scaffold, she had tasted prison life, but released after 
a month ^ had returned to her lodging in the Cordeliers, 
of which one year of the lease had been paid in advance. 
She had become very timid. Devoid of resources (the 

tails gives it still greater importance in her mouth" {National 
Archives, F% 6979.) Fran^oise gave recitals of her narrative even 
at the Chateau of the Tuileries, vi^here she often visited Baronne 
Hue, and at the house of the mother of the latter, these ladies 
"firmly believing in the possibility of the Dauphin's existence, but 
regarding the hope of his re-establishment as very difficult, as the 
King does not wish in any manner to throw light on the mystery 
which envelopes the prisoner of Rouen." (The same file.) 
^National Archives, F^ 6806. 

364 



ENQUIRIES 

sale of Simon's wardrobe had produced but 70 livres),^ 
she had had to dispose of the three shares in the Lafarge 
Tontine which constituted the whole of the savings of 
the household. She was, moreover, greatly enfeebled by 
attacks of asthma and subject to vomiting which ex- 
hausted her. To complete her ill-luck, she was obliged 
in April, 1795, to leave her lodging, as it was required 
to be included in the annex of the School of Surgery. She 
found shelter in a neighbouring house, but, overcome by 
poverty, decided to implore the pity of the Government 
and, thanks to the support of Dr. Naudin, who had at- 
tended her at the Temple and had never abandoned her, 
she was admitted, on April 12th, 1796, to the Hospital des 
Incurables of the Rue de Sevres.^ 

The hospital sheltered four hundred and forty in- 
mates, free to go out at certain hours of the day. Those 
whose wardrobe was presentable dressed as they liked; 
but the majority wore the uniform dress given out at 
the steward's office, consisting of a skirt and bodice of 
grey molleton, a linen fichu, and a black tulle cap over 
a band of white batiste.^ At this time the woman Simon 
entered the hospital, none of her companions or the nurses 
were aware of her past; but, doubtless, as long as the 
Republic lasted, they did not dare to question her on the 
subject of her recollections of the Royal prison. She her- 
self, although she liked to talk, must have shown her- 
self prudently discreet. Then, with time, things changed. 
The nurses were replaced by nuns of Saint Vincent de 
Paul,^ the spirit of the house was modified, and, 
although the events of the Terror were already very old- 
fashioned, people began to "look askance" at the woman 
«vho had been the wife of the legendary cobbler. There 

^Archives of the Seine. State property administration, 126. 

^Now the Laennec Hospital. 

^Tesson. Hospices de Paris. Liancourt. Visite des hospices and 
Rapport siir les hospices, year XL 

*From 1810 the lay staff seems to have completely disappeared 
from the Incurables. At least that is the date indicated in certain 
depositions to be found later. 

365 



THE DAUPHIN 

is no place where stories of martyred children cause so 
much emotion, anger and indignation as in a hospital of 
old women who have not been or are no longer mothers. 
Indignant at the censorious countenances and reproba- 
tory allusions, the woman Simon let out her secret. She 
had taken great care of her little Prince, her Charles; 
she had exposed herself to save him ; for he was not dead. 
On the day she removed from the Temple they had carried 
away little Capet in a cart filled with linen and put another 
child in his place in the prison. The confession having 
escaped her lips, the woman Simon repeated it to every 
comer; she spoke of nothing else. Was this gossip or 
boasting? Was it prompted by a need to rehabilitate 
herself and escape the reproaches of her companions.'* 
Perhaps so. This is a point which it would be very im- 
portant to decide, and we are assisted therein by numer- 
ous testimonies, which it is impossible to reject; those 
of the venerable Sisters of Saint Vincent de Paul, who, 
from 1810 to 1819, that is to say the whole of the time 
of the woman Simon^s sojourn, were attached to the hos- 
pital and were in daily relations with the former jailoress 
of the Dauphin. These testimonies were taken down 
later in the presence of the Lady Superior of the Com- 
munity by the Abbes Mathieu and Andre. The latter, 
who became Apostolic Protonotary, published a methodi- 
cal course of canonical law and a dictionary of civil and 
ecclesiastical law,^ which does not indicate a superficial 
mind easy to deceive and inclined to act thoughtlessly. 
The nuns examined were four in number: Sister Lucie 
Jonnis, Sister Euphrasie Benoit, Sister Catherine Mauliot 
and Sister Marianne Scribes. Their narratives agree re- 
garding the confidences of the cobbler's widow. On Janu- 
ary 19th, 1794, they had brought to the Temple, for 
the Simons' removal, a vehicle containing "a wicker work 
hamper with a double bottom, a pasteboard horse and 
several toys," intended for the young Prince. From the 
^Henri Loiseleur. Le Temps, April, 1884. 

366 



ENQUIRIES 

pasteboard horse they took out the child substituted for 
the Dauphin and enveloped the latter in a bundle of soiled 
linen which they loaded on to the vehicle with the ham- 
per. . . . When going out the guardians wished to ex- 
amine the cart but Simon flew into a passion and hustled 
them, shouting that it was his dirty linen, and so they 
let him pass. "She did not know, however, to what place 
the little rescued boy had been taken; but she was con- 
vinced that he was living and would one day wear the 
crown." — "You are young, you are," she said to Sister 
Lucie; "you will see him on the throne, but I, I am old, 
I shall not see him. . . ." 

The declarations of the woman Simon remained for a 
long time unknown. When they were published they con- 
siderably embarrassed certain historians or certain pre- 
tenders, whose thesis, based for a long time past on other 
data, was weakened by these inopportune revelations. 
They save themselves by declaring that the inmate of the 
Incurables was insane, made stupid by the abuse of alco- 
hol, and that no reliance should be placed on her divaga- 
tions. It is important then, again, to point out, in 
the narrative of the Sisters, their unanimous attestation 
that the woman Simon was neither insane, nor imbecile, 
nor a lunatic ; "that she possessed good sense and a good 
heart ; that she was clean and had never been seen drunk ; 
that she did not believe in dreams, was sincere, frank, 
and of good faith"; that she took communion at least 
five or six times a year"; and finally that "nobody had 
influenced her, because before 1814, she never saw any- 
body; yet she had never erred or varied in her state- 
ments." -'■ 

The Sisters were not alone in receiving the confidences of 
"Mere Simon" ; she unbosomed herself willingly, and from 
before the Restoration it was a secret to nobody at the In- 
curables that the Dauphin's former jailoress attested she 

'The declarations of the nuns, bearing the signatures of the Abbes 
Mathieu and Andre, have been reproduced in La Restoration con- 
vaincue d'usurpation, by M. Suvigny. 

367 



THE DAUPHIN 

had saved the Prince and "suffered no contradiction there- 
on.'* The declaration of Dr. Remusat is one of the most 
precious since it comes from a savant whose laborious quie- 
tude was manifestly but litle troubled by historical riddles. 
He has related ^ that, in 1811, when a house-pupil of the 
Incurables, he heard one of the inmates complain of the 
regime of the hospital. "Ah! if my children were only 
here," she moaned, "they would not leave me without 
assistance." When he rebuked her, in a tone of com- 
forting remonstrance, she said: "Oh, you don't know of 
what children I am speaking. I mean my little Bour- 
bons, whom I love with all my heart." — "Your little Bour- 
bons !" — "Yes, I was the gouvernante of the children 
of Louis XVI."— "But the Dauphin is dead.?"— "No, he 
is not.'* And then, continues the doctor, "she related to 
me that the Dauphin had been abducted on January 19th, 
1794. I am not quite certain whether it was in a bundle 
of linen or otherwise. I put other questions to her but 
that was all I learnt. I descended and asked the chief 
medical officer who the woman was and was told that she 
was the widow of the jailor of the Temple." As we see, 
already in the days of the Empire the abduction of Janu- 
ary 19th, 1794, was common talk at the Incurables. 
The inmates being authorised to go into the town, the 
story was noised abroad and it is not astonishing that 
in 1816 a secret agent heard an echo of it in the district 
and that, having transmitted it to his hierarchic superiors, 
it reached the ears of the Minister. 

Still living! The widow of the cobbler Simon! The 
best infonned witness of the peripetias of the tragedy 
of the Temple! Such a discovery was important. . . . 
Yet it did not produce any agreeable sensation in the 
entourage of the Royal family, for the very simple reason 
that it had been known for a long time past and had been 
prudently hidden. 

^Dr. R^musat's deposition was published by the Gazette des 
Tribunaux on November 3rd, 1834. It appeared in the Journal des 
Debats and the Temps in almost identical words, 

368 



ENQUIRIES 

A few days after her arrival in Paris the Duchesse 
d'Angouleme undertook to visit all the hospitals and chari- 
table institutions of the capital. On Tuesday, December 
13th, 1814, at one o'clock in the afternoon, she called 
at the Incurables in the Rue de Sevres, accompanied by 
Comte de Pastoret and Vicomte de Montmorency, a mem- 
ber of the general council of hospitals. L'ami de la Re- 
ligion et du Roi gives a report of that visit. ^ The same 
nuns whose declarations are summarised above agree in 
testifying that, on the arrival of Madame, the woman 
Simon, in accordance with "orders given," was locked up 
in a private room called the Capharnaiim and not let out 
until after the Princess's departure. Simon "was in a 
great fury." — "What a misfortune !" she cried. "I had 
a great secret to communicate to her!" The proceeding 
was fully justified, for it would have been unbecoming 
to expose the daughter of Louis XVI to so moving an en- 
counter. But some time afterwards the Duchesse re- 
turned to the Incurables without being announced and 
dressed very simply in order to preserve her incognito. 
She drew near to the woman Simon, engaged her in con- 
versation, and listened, as so many others had done, to 
the confidences of her brother's former jailoress. The 
woman, as one may well imagine, did not stint her words 
and attested that "her Charles" had come to see her "in 
1802." Madame, hiding her emotion, showed herself in- 
credulous : "From the Tower of the Temple until 1802," 
she said, "is a long time! How were you able to recog- 
nise him?" — "Madame," replied Mere Simon, "I recognise 
you quite well, notwithstanding your disguise, although 
I have not seen you for very much longer. . . . You are 
Madame Marie Therese. . . ." The Duchesse d'An- 
gouleme turned on her heels and disappeared. This 
anecdote has all the characteristics of being apocryphal 
and we should have to put it down to fancy if we did 
not possess the "officially taken" declaration of the woman 

»Vol. Ill, No. 70, p. 288. 

S69 



THE DAUPHIN 

Simon herself, a declaration asserting that she received 
a visit at the Incurables from Madame, and if we had 
not also the testimony of the nobleman who accompanied 
the Princess when she took that compromising step. The 
Comte de Montmaur, her "ambassador" to the prisoner 
of Rouen, made, in fact, to the latter the following con- 
fidence overheard by the doorkeeper Libois : "The 
Duchesse d'Angouleme had such a presentiment herself 
and went to the Rue de Sevres, with a lady of honour 
and an officer, to see the woman Simon there. It was he, 
the Comte de Montmaur, who was that officer." ^ 

It is proved, therefore, that the Court was already 
aware of the woman Simon's existence when a police agent 
revealed the fact to it. Why, then, did they delay so 
long in questioning her.'' Because they wished to put the 
matter off as long as possible. But the pilgrimage to 
the Incurables, attracting an ever increasing number of 
devotees daily,^ the Minister of Police decided that they 
would impose silence on the old chatterbox, a prudent 
but very regrettable decision, for it deprived history of 
the most precious of all testimonies, that of the last wit- 
ness of what happened at the Tower on January 19th, 
1794, the date at which began, never more to cease, "the 
mystery of the Temple." 

The examination took place on November 16th, 1816.^ 
*'A person came to the Incurables and took away the 
woman Simon, who remained part of the day absent." 
They took her to the Ministry of Police. It would have 
been very easy to have heard her entire confession: all 
that was necessary was to inspire confidence in her, to 
appear to have faith in her gossip. . . . But, instead 

^Archives of the Clerk of the Court of Rouen. See Saint-Leger's 
Louis XVII dit Charles de Navarre, p. 156, for the text of the 
declaration: "They — Madame's envoys — remained with Charles from 
two and a half to three hours," said Libois. "I came and went 
during that time. I heard . . ." etc. 

^"A doctor who came, like so many others, to pay his tribute to 
curiosity. . . ." National Archives, F' 6806. 

'Monday, the 18th, according to another document in the same file. 

S70 



ENQUIRIES 

of that, they rebuked and contradicted her! Her open- 
ing was promising. She declared that when she left the 
Tower of the Temple, the son of Louis XVI was in good 
health. The child's features were so engraved on her 
heart that she would recognise him if ever he appeared 
to her again. At the bottom of the left {sic) jaw he had 
an ineffaceable scar resulting from the bite of a white 
rabbit the Prince was rearing when he lived at the 
Tuileries. She was absolutely convinced that the Dauphin 
did not die in the Tower of the Temple, as was reported 
in those days, and this conviction was so intimate that 
nothing could dissuade her from it. . . ." Well started, 
they had only to let her continue to speak. But suddenly 
— did Decazes preside at the examination? ^ — they pressed 
her to explain, asked her what could have suggested to 
her so subversive an opinion "regarding an event the 
whole of the circumstances of which had been so minutely 
ascertained?" Whereupon she immediately became dis- 
trustful, began to retreat and take fright. Instead of 
speaking clearly, as she had done for so many years past, 
she had recourse to vague allusions, to a hamper of linen 
she had been passing and into which they might have in- 
troduced a child, to a remark of Dr. Desault, to a cousin 
of hers, a doorkeeper at the Place Vendome, who had given 
her news of the escaped Prince. . . . The functionaries be- 
fore whom the trembling old woman appeared rebuked and 
lectured her harshly, observing with very good reason, that 
all this was improbable and "had no consistence except 
through her credulity, kept alive by the absurd news for- 
merly in circulation." They frightened her and to such 
an extent that she began to protest "that she had always 
desired the return of the Bourbons and that everybody 
at the Incurables was not "of the same opinion"; she 
guaranteed her discretion even in regard to her room- 

*The widow Simon was questioned, not in an office but in a saloon, 
which must have been sumptuous, since she thought she was at the 
Tuileries. (The same file, report of August 2nd, 1817.) It was 
doubtless the Minister's room. 

371 



THE DAUPHIN 

mates ; she was inspired only by the desire to see her 
wishes realised. . . . Then she signed these mutilated 
declarations, so dissimilar from the divulgations she 
usually made. They dismissed her with the order to say 
nothing in the future under pain of the severest punish- 
ment.^ 

When she returned to the hospital she was terrified. 
"I can't say anything more. ... I can't say anything 
more," she murmured. "My life is at stake !" The sisters 
noticed that "since that time she was sad" and concluded 
from this "that they had sought to intimidate her." In 
which they were right, and such was the unanimous opin- 
ion of those who were acquainted with this new obstruc- 
tion. The rumour of it reached Rouen, from which place 
Branzon wrote to the Due de Trevise that they had 
"closed the mouth" of the woman Simon. 

Charles de Navarre's partisans were sufficiently power- 
ful not to accept this stifling of the affair. They applied 

— obstinate but naive — to M. M. , the well-known 

counsel whom the cautious Government had hastened to 
supply to the pseudo-Dauphin, and who followed M. De- 

cazes' instructions in everything. Now, M. M. was 

unable to refuse the followers the satisfaction of question- 
ing the jailoress of the Temple, so three of them called 
at the Incurables and had a fairly long conversation with 
the old inmate, a conversation all the details of which 
were, a few days later, reported to the Minister of Police. 
Less confused than on the occasion of her first exam- 
ination, she was more loquacious. She began by attest- 
ing that when she left the Temple the Dauphin was full 
of strength and had no symptom of the illness from which 
it was said he suffered. She had no doubt whatever that 
he had been abducted, for she herself had seen a rachitic 
and deformed child leave the school of surgery, and who, in 
a hamper loaded on a vehicle with dirty linen, was taken 
to the Temple, where he was to replace the little Prince. 
^National Archives, F^ 6806. 

372 



ENQUIRIES 

She had declared all this, she said, at a sort of examination 
she had undergone a few months before . . . but "she knew 
many other more serious and decisive things about which 
she would speak only when before the Court," certain, 
moreover, "of being able to recognise the prisoner of 
Rouen and be recognised by him if he were really Louis 
XVII." 1 

Later, the woman Simon was to speak again — at the 
time of her death. On June 10th, 1819, when the hospi- 
tal chaplain drew near to her bed to administer to her, 
Sister Augustine, kneeling, asked the dying woman "if 
there were nothing which troubled her." — "I shall always 
say what I have said," replied the cobbler's widow; which 
the nun interpreted as follows : — "In the presence of the 
sacraments and death she wished to confess the testimony 
which she had never ceased to render to the Dauphin's 
escape and to his existence." ^ 



One may differ in opinion on the subject of the woman 
Simon's declarations; set one's mind only on the "offi- 
cial" deposition, certainly weakened and perhaps multi- 
lated by the police functionaries, or rely, in preference, 
upon what she said when speaking without fear and with- 
out dissimulation before visitors and the nuns of the In- 
curables, as on the occasion of the last solemn attesta- 
tion ; but one must agree in recognising that for the trial 
so slowly and cautiously prepared at Rouen she was the 
obligatory witness. The only survivor of that period of 
captivity in the Temple before whom no doubt could arise 
concerning the identity of the Royal child, she was neither 
insane, nor a drunkard, nor a person who talked non- 

^National Archieves, F' 6806. 

'Sister Vincent, the granddaughter of Pauline de Tourzel, collected 
the same traditions from certain sisters of her order. See Bevue 
de Paris, September 1st, 1904. 

37S 



THE DAUPHIN 

sense. However, supposing she were in her dotage, that 
would soon have been seen. She alone was able, by 
questioning her regarding certain private details of for- 
mer days, to confound the impostor from whom the ju- 
dicial authorities had been unsuccessfully trying to obtain 
a confession for the past two years. Yet the Government 
was opposed to her being confronted with the Pretender! 
It was not so much that they feared a very improbable 
recognition, but that they did not wish those serious and 
decisive revelations which the old woman, instructed by 
her "sort of examination" had promised to make only in 
the presence of magistrates, to come out. This is again 
proof that the Restoration demanded silence and feared 
the light.. We possess a still more striking one. In his 
perplexity, the Attorney-General of Rouen saw the day 
of the trial approach not without anxiety, for he knew 
that Charles de Navarre was a man "who would carry 
audacity and impudence to the utmost limit." To cut 
the pretensions of this lying pseudo-Dauphin short 
nothing could equal the irrefutable demonstration of the 
death of the true Dauphin, so he put the matter before 
the Minister. "Do there not exist positive proofs, sure 
and authentic documents certifying the death and burial 
of Mgr. the Dauphin? To destroy all prejudice and 
quiet all minds, would it not be a good thing that these 
documents should appear for, indeed, if it is formally and 
legally proved that Mgr. le Dauphin is dead and was 
buried, no living man can be Mgr. le Dauphin." ^ The 
magistrate saw clearly and attached such great impor- 
tance to this demonstration that, not having received a 
reply to his first request, he took the liberty of insisting, 
demanding the documents which he had asked to be sent 
as indispensable. The Minister at last replied: "The 
communication of the documents which establish the death 
of the Dauphin being of a nature to give them a disagree- 
able publicity, it is desirable that the magistrates should 
^National Archives, BB 18, Document 86. 

374 



ENQUIRIES 

dispense with them." ^ A wretched and almost miser- 
able defeat, equivalent to a confession. No, the Govern- 
ment did not possess sure and authentic documents estab- 
lishing the death and burial of the son of Louis XVI. 

As to Charles de Navarre, the former Phelippeaux, or 
Mathurin Bruneau, he revealed himself throughout the 
trial, which opened before the Correctional Tribunal on 
February 11th, 1818, to be the most active adversary of 
his own cause and thus made the task of the King's Attor- 
ney an easy one. Instead of the "Dauphin" whom people 
expected, they saw in the dock a furious lout, "insulting 
the president and the public prosecutor, his guards, the 
witnesses and the entire court, sneering, feverish, agi- 
tated and brutal with intentional vulgarity and feigned 
audacity." His followers did not recognise in this lout 
the "badly modelled but cunning" Prince they had adu- 
lated at Bicetre, a "Prince" without instruction it is 
true, but redeeming his defects in education by a prepos- 
sessing familiarity, a delicate good nature, a certain lofti- 
ness, and sometimes a "courtly air," enabling him to con- 
verse for several hours without displeasing them such 
noblemen as M. de Montmaur or M. de la Tour d'Au- 
vergne. Did he hope by inveighing against the Tribunal 
to be sent before a jurisdiction more worthy of his pre- 
tensions.'' Had they intentionally made him intoxicated, 
as has been alleged, by mixing with his food some exciting 
substance, or had he become tipsy of his own accord in 
order "to screw himself up to pitch.'*" It matters little. 
In truth, his case collapsed. At the close of the sitting 
his "followers" slunk away, shamefaced amidst the laugh- 
ter of simple spectators who had been amused by the 
blackguardly remarks and evasive answers of the man who 
had been held up as "the hope of the lilies" and the "the de- 
livering angel of bruised France." Bruneau was con- 
demned to five years' imprisonment, increased by two 
years for contempt of court. At the end of his term of 

^The same file. Document 85. 

375 



THE DAUPHIN 

imprisonment he was to be placed "at the disposal of the 
Government." ^ 

But already interest was no longer centered on the con- 
demned man; but on the "secrets" of the trial, on the 
suspected long intrigues and on the fear inspired in the 
Restoration by this wretched puppet and by the terribly 
anxious problem raised by his demonstration. It was 
learnt, owing to bitter discussions among counsels, that 
before the sitting their word of honour had been obtained 
not to utter a word relating either to the events of the 
Temple or to "the so-called escape of the son of Louis 

XVI." The spy M , who, in his exordium, speaking 

of the child martyr, ventured a most hazy allusion to 
those "who had spread the rumour of his death," was 
called to order by the president, requested to sit down 
and be silent. The Restoration would not tolerate a 
piece of testimony, a phrase or a word permitting a dis- 
cussion over the reality of an event of which it refused 
to furnish proofs. How many sincere Royalists would 
have been happy and relieved to be delivered of a tor- 
menting doubt ! The authorities would not consent to 
do it. Why.'' Was it because they were unable.? It was 
from that time that "the Louis XVII question" dates and 
it was the government of Louis XVIII which unconsciously 
raised it. 



Thus was the door opened wide to all impostors. We 
know with what fecundity they multiplied. Nothing was 
easier and more tempting than to pretend to be a per- 
son from whom credulous folk demanded merely a few dis- 
tant childish recollections, which might permissibly be un- 
controllable and effaced. Neither special knowledge nor 
documentation of any kind was necessary. A slightly aqui- 
line nose and a few appropriately used anecdotes taken 

*He died on April ^th, 1822, at the prison of Mont. St MicheL 

376 



ENQUIRIES 

from Clery's journal — that was more than was required 
to impose on simple people. False Napoleons have been 
excessively rare, because the part would have necessitated 
certain uncommon aptitudes. Better not run the risk of 
having to submit to the test of presiding at a council of 
state or gaining a pitched battle. On the other hand, pre- 
tenders to the personality of the son of Louis XVI have 
been numerous. La Sicotiere formerly drew up a very 
incomplete list. They have been encountered in the ma- 
jority of the provinces of France and in several foreign 
countries; they have been seen in England, at Uzes, at 
St. Nazaire, in Denmark, in Anjou, in Canada, in 
Auvergne, in the Republic of Columbia, at Lyons, in the 
Sechelles Isles, and in Alsace. ... A few of them have 
recruited followers; others appeared only to disappear 
immediately. The naming of these pretenders would be 
tedious, although it would be rash to state that certain 
of their traces, hardly visible, would not lead to some 
interesting track. We shall say nothing here of the two 
most famous of the pretenders. Baron de Richemont and 
Naundorff. Their causes are still discussed, magisterially 
attacked and defended with passion.^ Our object here has 
been to treat merely the question of the escape without 
aspiring to launch out into the psychological fogs of the 
question of identity. Now, the chances of elucidating the 
problem of the abduction from the Temple ended with the 
trial of Mathurin Bruneau, since at that time, when so 
many witnesses were still living and all of them ready 
to speak, the Courts, foolishly inspired, only succeeded 
in rendering the obscurity still deeper. If it were abso- 
lutely necessary to find a conclusion to the long state- 
ment of documents and testimonies which is here con- 

^To know Richemont's thesis one must read M4moires d'un con- 
temporain que le revolution fit orpkelin eu 1793. . . . Paris, 1846. 
The bibliography of the "Naundorff affair" is very considerable. Our 
advice is to read, for and against, the remarkable work by Henri 
Provins (M. H. Foulon de Vaulx), Le dernier roi legitime de France, 
2 vols., and the learned studies of M. G. de Manteyer, La petition 
Naundorff au Sevut, 1 vol. in 8 vo. 

377 



THE DAUPHIN 

eluded, it would be that the supposition of the subtrac- 
tion of the Dauphin by Chaumette, with the complicity of 
Simon and his wife, on the night of January 19th, 1794, 
accords better than any other with the known circum- 
stances of the captivity in the Temple. What can have 
become of the Royal child? Perhaps he died in the deep 
retreat where, awaiting the opportunity of using him. his 
saviour hid him, a saviour who himself died before he had 
revealed or profited by his combination. If the child 
lived, perhaps, without support, without advice, without 
a name, without any proof of his august origin, without 
other followers than casual ones, did he try to awaken 
fortuitous recognition and devotion? Without attribut- 
ing to Hervagault's history an importance up to now 
unjustified, it assuredly proves that such a supposition 
is probable and that a similar attempt was destined to 
certain failure. 

In truth, and although it may be pitiful, to conclude so 
long a narrative with these words : We do not know. The 
discovery of the Temple registers, "mislaid" for more than 
a hundred years, would, perhaps, throw some light on the 
question. Barras* Memoire justiflcatifs, which have been 
promised us, would be convincing if authenticated in an 
indisputable manner, although we should not know through 
him whether the child taken from the prison by the 
future Director was or was not the son of Louis XVI. 
Barras may have been deceived on that point, may have 
detected the fraud and perpetuated it to make it the 
weapon of his rancour and the stake of his underhand 
dealings. All that searchers whose resolution is not dis- 
couraged by this Penelope-like enquiry can obtain to-day 
are a few statements of detail, a few fortunate sets-ofF, 
resulting in the elimination of errors and the destruction 
of legends, but not serving as a historical base for a 
fresh conception of this disconcerting subject. Such, for 
instance, are the investigations which, on several occa- 
sions, have been made with the object of dragging from 

878 



ENQUIRIES 

the soil of the Sainte-Marguerite cemetery, overflowing 
with corpses, the secret it has guarded for a hundred and 
twenty-five years. 

In November, 1846, the Abbe Haumet, Cure of Sainte- 
Marguerite, a man well acquainted with the traditions of 
his parish, seized the pretext of building a shed against 
the transept of his church to make excavations on the 
spot where the grave digger Betrancourt, declared he had 
buried the Dauphin's body after withdrawing it from the 
common grave. Digging was carried out at night and a 
few blows with a pickaxe brought to light, at the exact 
place formerly indicated by Betrancourt, a coffin — of 
lead! which was carried to the presbytery and opened in 
the presence of a few priests and several doctors con- 
voked by M. Haumet. At the first glance, those present 
were struck by the strange disproportion between the 
arms, legs and trunk of the skeleton, the body being that 
of a child, whilst the members appeared to belong to one 
of a much more advanced age.^ But, on looking at the 
brain-pan of the skull, sawed in two above the level of the 
orbits, and at a few remnants of reddish golden hair which 
seemed to be still adhering, they had no longer any doubt 
that they were in the presence of the remains of the child 
on whom the autopsy was made at the Temple, and Drs. 
Milcent and Recamier, assisted by their confreres Tessier 
and Davasse, examined it attentively. Their report 
shows that these bones were very probably those of a 
male "subject," but presented "abnormal peculiarities." 
— "The ribs and clavicles are certainly those of a very 
young subject," write Drs. Milcent and Recamier. "The 
head and bones of the trunk appear to indicate a more 
advanced age — about twelve years ; whilst the members 
and teeth are those of an adult of fifteen to eighteen 
years." The conclusions were uncertain; they remain 
disturbing and are formulated as follows: "It appears 

^Recollections of the Abbe Bossuet, witness of the exhumation. 
L. Lambeau. Le cimetidre Sainte Marguerite, p. 183 and following 
page. 

379 



THE DAUPHIN 

demonstrated that these bones are those of the child 
confined in the Temple and whose autopsy was made by 
Drs. Dumangin, Pelletan, Lassus and Jeanroy . . . but 
it is absolutely impossible that this skeleton could have 
been that of a child of ten years and a few months ; it can 
only have belonged to a young boy of fifteen to sixteen." * 

Forty-eight years after the exhumation of 1846, the 
question not having advanced a step despite repeated and 
meritorious efforts, a fresh enquiry was undertaken at 
the request of Maitre Laguerre. The soil of Sainte-Mar- 
guerite was again turned and, at the spot where the Abbe 
Haumet had deposited them, the bones, enclosed by him 
in an oak box, bearing on one of its sides the inscription 
L. . . . XVII, were brought to light. . . . For a few 
days they were exposed to the pious gaze of visitors and 
the investigation of savants. Both one and the other came 
in large numbers. Specialists, including Drs. Backer," 
Bilhaut,^ Magitot,^ and Manouvrier,^ decided that they, 
indeed, had before them the skeleton already exhumed in 
1846. They recognised the skull "sawed in two by a very 
expert hand"; the curvature of the ribs, "the lack of devel- 
opment of the thoracic cage denoting a certain degree of 
rachitis"; they found a "lock," twelve centimetres long, 
of curly hair "of a reddish golden" colour and extremely 
fine; and from an attentive examination of the skull, the 
vertebrae, tibias, femurs and teeth, it resulted that the 
skeleton was that of a boy of sixteen to eighteen — perhaps 
more — and who had reached a height of 1 m. 60 c.® 

And we remember . . . that the son, the true son of 

^La question Louis XVII et la cimetiire Sainte Marguerite by G. 
Milcent. Extracted from the Bulletin de la 8oci4t4 du d'mulation 
du Bourhonnais, 1904. 

^Director of the Revue antisepsic. 

'Children's surgeon at the International Hospital. 

^Member of the Academy of Medicine. 

^Professor at the School of Anthropology. 

*The average stature in Paris for boys of sixteen years is 1 m. 
58, for those of 19 years 1 m. 63. Louis XVII au cimeti^re Ste- 
Marguerite enquiry made by Dr. Felix de Backer with several 
photographs. 

380 



ENQUIRIES 

the tailor Hervagault was born four years before the 
Dauphin . . . that, however, when he was arrested at 
Chalons in 1798 he did not appear, according to the 
official description, "to exceed the age of thirteen years of 
age" instead of the seventeen he had in reality . . . if he 
was Hervagault. We remember that coffin of 45 c. in 
length ordered on the 10th of June, 1795, by the director 
of the funeral, Voisin, and this body of 1 m. 60 c. it had 
to contain ! . . . We remember the report of the autopsy, 
in which four eminent practitioners testify that "the body 
which was presented to them was that of a child about 
ten" — ^whose skeleton, fifty years later, presented all the 
characteristics of a much more advanced age. . . . We 
remember that the grave digger Betrancourt, when with- 
drawing the coffin from the Temple from the common 
"trench," in order to place it in a private grave, might 
easily have made a mistake as to the coffin ; but this skull, 
sawed by an expert hand," excludes all idea of error or 
confusion, unless by a diabolical combination of circum- 
stances, two bodies of children on whom autopsies had 
been performed were brought that night to the cemetery. 
. . . We also remember that this same Betrancourt, after 
having buried deeply the coffin of the Dauphin along the 
church wall, may, as a precaution, have placed on it an 
old lead coffin filled with bones chosen at leisure in the 
charnel house. In 1846, after a few blows with a pickaxe, 
this first coffin is discovered, and the searchers proceed 
no further ... so that the little dead boy of the Temple 
may still — perhaps — be where the grave digger placed 
him, "to the left of the church door, at the same side as 
the altar of the communion, right against the foundation 
wall." — In the presence of these long tibias and dispro- 
portionate members, we remember the vision of that com- 
missioner, mounting guard at the Temple in the last days 
of the captivity, who was astonished to note the great 
stature of the prisoner seated on his bed, and who thought 
what it would have been if he had been on his feet." — In 

381 



THE DAUPHIN 

the presence of this diagnostic of a "certain degree of 
rachitis,'* arrived at after the examination of the bones 
in 1894, we remember that "rachitic and deformed'* child 
whom the woman Simon said she had seen leave the School 
of Surgery and whom they took to the Temple where he 
was to replace the Dauphin. . . . 

I In the history of this sovereign without subjects, an 
enigmatic history even beyond the tomb, everything tot- 
ters and collapses as soon as we flatter ourselves that we 
have laid a course or erected the frail scaffolding of an 
argument. The shade of the poor persecuted king takes 
its revenge by perpetuating the obscurity of the shadows 
with which men have wished to envelop his life ; it claims, 
in expiation, the indefinite homage of our perplexities ; 
despite our efforts to escape from its intercourse, it re- 
minds us of its existence, imposes itself upon us and will 
not allow itself to be forgotten. To efface the night- 
mare, our fathers demolished the sinister Tower; for more 
than a century not a single stone of it has existed. The 
old dungeon having disappeared, a weeping willow grew on 
its site, and for nearly a hundred years its sorrowful 
branches trembled on that prophetic spot. The tree also 
was cut down. Then someone — someone who did not know 
of the tragic legend, most certainly a careless functionary 
— took at hazard from the city depositary a statue, ware- 
housed there with so many others. They have placed it 
there, without any symbolic idea in view, without any 
other preconceived intention than that of "filling a space," 
of ornamenting a scrap of lawn . . . and behojd the little 
plaintive shade is evoked again, claiming the perennity of 
our recollections. This statue of the Square du Temple is 
a figure of Diogenes, advancing in the dark, raising his 
lantern, and, in the obscurity, "seeking a man." 

THJE END 



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